Friday, August 19, 2016
I love this stuff - the one-lunger lives! An OSHA nightmare.
1909 10HP Blackstone oil engine was used for pumping water from a river to a market garden. The engine was sabotaged in the 1920s by someone blowing up the cylinder with explosives. A new cylinder was installed and the engine was returned to service for a number of years when it eventually fell into disuse. A number of river floodings submerged the engine and it was eventually partially buried in silt. It was recovered in the 1990s and in 1997 it was dismantled, cleaned and started again after many years of neglect. The starting procedure requires heating of the hot bulb with a blow lamp in order to vaporise the fuel ( kerosene ) and to preheat the internal combustion chamber to allow fuel ignition.
Via the always good American Digest
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Awesome!
ReplyDeleteI wonder why it was sabotaged. Luddites? Wobblies? Migrants?
ReplyDelete=T.W.=
Jealous neighbor, Scottish rovers, Teen age Vandals....
DeleteSierra Club? Irish rovers? EPA?
DeleteAlGore?
=T.W.=
I have a small collection of hit and miss flywheel engines.
ReplyDeleteThey are't for the careless, nor the stupid. Open gears waiting for your fingers, cuffs or whatever they can grab. High(ish) voltage availabe to shock you from the open magnetoes.
Just starting them incorrectly can lead to injury.
You gotta be smart and careful or you can hurt yourself. So far, I haven't...Guess I've been lucky.
I guess the builders assumed that competent people would be operating them.
Or smart and deliberate. I'm always amazed at how people get hurt just by rushing stuff.
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ReplyDeleteUnreal.
ReplyDeleteI love old machinery, that was way cool.
Unreal.
ReplyDeleteI love old machinery, that was way cool.