Jay Leno's Most Powerful Steam Engine | Behind the Scenes

this is our modern Clayton steam generator this is how we make Steam to run the uh the 1866 steam engine and some of the other steam engines now normally what they would have done in the old days is you have a big cast iron tank here you fill it with water and you build a fire under it I'd be shoveling colon we'd be shoveling coal which is really dangerous and those have a tendency to crack or even explode whereas this it's all modern it's all computerized this is what they would use in a modern power plant all we're doing is utilizing the steam to run an old steam engine but uh it's a pretty bulletproof unit we added a little bit of Antiquity to it by putting our big steering wheel on you gotta have that just it's kind of fun to spin that thing and you can make Steam in about 10 minutes we're in the old days it would take three four five hours to get up enough heat so as you can see we're just going we're cycling through the motions now we want to put him hit the round button yeah they can't take it anymore Captain she's got a ball so what's happening now what's happening now is the starting them on that water will start to get hot a little bit when I'm there then we can open some of these other valves can put your hand in there it's not hot thanks as soon as you get the steam out of there one is dirty isn't it yeah why is it why is the water the color it is well I've been sitting in the boiler can be rusty boilers use boiler tubing they're not using stain the boiler to transfer heat pattern and stainless stuff all right now what okay now closer thank you good bounce I opened that a couple of times and I'm a Reagan captain that's the mouth that puts on the inside all right let's eat you don't want to lose that sheet yeah this is a simple procedure the shutdown is even more now Auto buttons push come on inside the last time you were here we were just putting this together I think you just had the footings Porter yeah this is our uh 1866 steam engine um this thing I hadn't run in about uh about 80 90 years that we know of and we're just getting it together and now we're going to fire it up here in a few minutes and and why do you have this um there's no logical reason why I don't think so I didn't think it's it's just cool yeah you know it's a fascinating piece of uh American technological history you know we always think of the 1860s we don't really we think of cowboys yeah and you know and and that time the wild west you don't think of industrial America and Lincoln was president when this thing was made and the fact that they move this across the country in horse and wagon you know we had two or three giant forklifts this weighs six tons this whole thing is eleven tons but this flywheel is and that's two pieces it's so big pieces yeah and it was it was made in Newburgh New York and moved all across the country this is all one casting and you know there's a lot of sophisticated Engineering in this uh this is the original lagging on it the original wood as you can see here this is what Thomas Edison used to demonstrate electricity to run his Dynamo big giant steam engine very similar to this one what happened with this thing was in 19 I think the late 20s Henry Ford bought it as an antique it was an antique vent and he bought it to put in his Museum Ford bought it as an antique Henry Ford bought as an antique to put in Greenfield Village and what happened was uh oh they just had a big auction uh about 15 years ago it was sold to a gentleman in Pennsylvania uh he bought it but never put it together and left it in the garage doors there was no door on one side so any of the wear and tear is really just the last 15 years but this is a real piece of American History it's all original it's massive it's so overbuilt it is overbelt this is this is the governor and the way this works is you've heard the expression balls out or balls to the wall um it's not what you think what it means is this Rises up as you'll see and it runs the governor it moves this cam if you come around this site is it is that centrifugal force yeah centrifugal force see this Governor here uh as it spins and trivical Forest pulls this up which pulls that which slides this cam you'll see it move in a minute which moves the valves up and down uh well I mean which keeps the vowels from opening so so you can't overrun the engine this is where the term balls to the wall or running balls out comes from it's when they're when Full House are fully out yeah here is your tachometer Revolution counter Revolution counter yeah that's your steam gauge right there uh what I'm going to do now is before we start it you're going to start this thing yeah we'll open it up here and we'll pump a little raw steam oil into the cylinders you you know you're more comfortable with steam than I am you know I like steam you know whereas internal combustion engines are incredibly violent with explosions and all this type of thing steam is it's just heat you know and it just they always call uh the real steam guys call it the hand of God because there's so much torque that really just pushes steam can move anything you know if you put if you weld it up a safe filled with water welded it shut and then put built a fire under eventually the water would bust that safe no matter how strong you made it what I'm doing now is I'm opening my Oilers what you hear is steam let me open my oil is here this engine is as I said 11 tons and rated 125 horsepower which doesn't sound like much by today's standards but back in the day that was pretty impressive uh you can feel Heat starting to come through the pipe yeah I think I'll Stand Back you've always been more comfortable with steam than I am jazz schemas see where we are let me uh we might be caught right on a we need to jog it or something yeah okay that's it watch out we're gonna watch out you're gonna tell me twice holy cow There She Goes foreign it feels like it should have those those things with the arcs going on I know I know I know I know it does but it's it's pretty amazing it's so quiet when you realize how much mass you're moving and this is okay that there is what you call your governor see those balls okay around this side I'll show you this is your cam see your cam moving your valves up and down okay now that cam moves according to this see see how this is risen up oh yeah okay you heard the expression balls out or balls to the wall this is where it comes from when the steam engine is running full power the balls are all the way out now you see now you notice yeah I always thought of something different no no no this camera this cam is shifted and as you can see it's not pushing the valve up as much because now the engine is running it's just about its top speed and it will just sit here and do that forever this will sit here for a hundred years in my life I mean when we pulled this engine out it hadn't run in almost 100 years and it's just a way it just sits and waits you know like an alligator in a swamp it sits there for a year and then boom and you got your tachometer here this is your throttle here this is your drip valve what this does is you open this when you start a steam engine because as you know water does not compress so you want to make sure it's steam so to get all the condensation out you open this up water drips out as you close that your engine will run more efficiently and all this I mean I'm seeing it leaking stuff here and that's all just that's condensation that's water that's that's fine that's just water you have this for well it's just a fascinating piece of History if you want to know where you're going I think with energy and power you kind of need to see where we've been you know and you know what's interesting when you see something like this you always think oh it'll be easy to put together people back then were simple you know something I've got some books on this and the amount of math and the amount of Science and volume to water versus you realize engineers and scientists have always been engineers in science absolutely they will always a guy from the 1800s that's a scientist it's smarter than you or I because we're not scientists you know and you realize wow I mean to put this together remember there were no computers or no tools as I mentioned each one of these bulbs is handmade um this is your automatic Oiler right here let me show you how this thing works no I don't know you see that bubble yeah see that bubble forming what will happen is that'll get real big it'll pop it'll go up here go into the steam line and lubricate the motor so it just it just throws the oil in there basically right you'll see you'll see it pick up there in a minute foreign [Applause] [Music] forces it in here and lubricates the piston what what a wild you see you have you have big toys well here's something else that's interesting what you have here let me show you how this is lubricated this is essentially just a I use a mop handle and what you do is you you fill this with oil you just squirt a lot of oil in here and the mop holds the oil in suspension and then eventually it seeps down and just leaks down in there onto the bearing yeah that's what that does that comes down onto there um this is probably the most dramatic angle of this thing holy cow yeah that's a that's a big arm there yeah it's a big arm as you can see not a lot of Osho when this thing was built see your oil is here those fill with oil those drip oil onto the bearings you can feel the wind from that Flyway it's quite a breeze but you shoot down there where I understand get where I mean shoot the long shot I I love the governor yeah watch out that thing will knock you out it's heavy and that's all one casting this whole thing this is all one casting and that just slides along just in a kind of a slime of oil yeah as you can see see how it works see all the oil back here yeah these these lubricate it strip oil down to there keep this all lubricated does that just fill up and spill over or is it well you can drain it if it gets too high you drain it out of here it becomes hypnotic you know this is what people did before television you'd sit and you'd watch this thing go around I'm sorry what were you saying exactly exactly but the simple-minded they can watch this thing for hours exactly exactly but you know it's just a fascinating piece of history and when you realize you could run this inside in a machine shop and it wasn't bang bang bang you know it was quiet I think there's no emission no there's no emissions from it because all your uh it's all all your power is outside what they used to do in the old machine shops is you run a big uh leather belt up to the roof which would power your legs yeah yeah and all your other equipment off this this would off be in the corner running by itself and the fact the fact you hear it at all now is the fact that it's still cold if you ran this for five hours by the end of the day you wouldn't hear anything because all the metal would get hot and it would it would quiet right down but considering we're indoors now there aren't many engines this size that you could run and still be able to stand here and talk you know so that's what's kind of cool about it it's in the factory this is all the original wood from the Civil War each one of these nuts and bolts is handmade and this is a big piston this would essentially be for lack of a better word your cylinder head this comes off and your piston is right in there Ingenuity isn't it huh yeah yeah it's now see I can slow that Governor down you'll see it's not to come down there's so much momentum there imagine it takes a while too what am I doing foreign now you'll see it come down it'll slide down on its shaft and you'll see this cam move over see you coming down yeah okay now this cam moves over and you're opening your valves a little bit more oh yeah it's working its way off this way now watch you'll see I open it up again you'll see it start to climb you climbing yep and you know something it's pretty foolproof I mean this is what the luddites were afraid of you know when they the luddites come in and saw this and they realize how many people are just going to put out of work this is what uh this is what started the whole Revolution with that kind of stuff they you know all the seamstress and all the Woolen Mills these put a lot of people out of business and that's why people were afraid of progress but this was real progress It's amazing this is 1866. that one there that one there is 1832. we don't have this one together yet that's the next thing next time you're here we'll run this now there's there's some balls all right that's right that's it you don't want to mess with those that's a big one it's time on that one right exactly amazing now I just out of curiosity though you got any cars oh we got some steam cars yeah yeah I'll show you uh I'll show you our latest Steam acquisition and uh we're just putting it together that'll be next when you stand back and watch it that is so I get a long shot of it foreign [Music] [Music] thank you thank you [Music] well this week out in California one of my favorite places Jay Leno's Garage he's always got something wild cooking let's see what's happening Jay how you hi hello Dennis good to see you again what what now that's an oil can yes that is indeed men when men and the women are glad of it Wooden Ships Iron Men yes sir is that is that an oil Kenny you're just happy to see me there you go that's what it is hey it's the family show

Channel: MyClassicCarTV

Views: 171,809

Keywords: My Classic Car, Classic Car, Dennis Gage, jay leno's steam engine, jay leno's garage, jay leno starting steam engine, jay leno steam power, jay leno steam, jay leno stationary steam engine, stationary steam engine, wright stationary steam engine, william wright steam engine, 1866 wright steam engine, 1800s steam engine, 1800's engines, oldest engines, powerful engines, powerful steam engines, starting steam engine, 1800's industrial history, industrial revolution steam, leno

Id: KW1s08r2yWg

Length: 19min 59sec (1199 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 28 2023