There was a TV series on the ABC here in Australia called Inventions >From The Shed: http://www.rebelfilms.com.au/inventions-from-the-shed.html One of the "inventions" was a guy who made steam engines for a whole range of applications - he and his father were responsible for a steam powered car that was shipped to the US during the 1970's petrol crisis. The interesting thing I took away from the show was that a steam engine is constant torque over its operating RPM so no need for a gearbox (which is apparently why you can see steam train wheels "spin" as they move away from stations). My wife bought me the DVD for my birthday a few years ago - highly recommended! Every one of my friends has been highly amused by the range of fanatical inventors and their absolute belief in their weird and wonderful inventions (I was particularly taken by the guy who made a plastic template that you hung of your ear so you could produce perfectly trimmed rock-a-billy sideburns - the kicker was that you could flip it over and use on your other ear so you only had to buy one template!). On Mon, Apr 23, 2012 at 6:11 PM, wrote: >> Thanks for the pointer. Wood-gas was not a term I would have known to se= arch. This >> looks like an interesting article. >> I remember a WW II soldier returning home with a story about a taxii rid= e somewhere >> that had a wood-gas system. >> He said the driver would have to stop to tinker once in a while but it w= orked well. > > If you have ever seen the UK originated TV series "Dads Army" about the H= ome Guard, one of the episodes they are driving around in a bus with a big = wood gas 'balloon' on top as the fuel supply. AIUI this was a common way of= storing the wood gas on the vehicle if you didn't have a convertor mounted= on the back bumper (which is probably what the taxi driver had, and had to= put more wood in every so often). > -- > Scanned by iCritical. > > -- > http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive > View/change your membership options at > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist --=20 http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist .