Well, all windmills are nuclear-powered.
And so is solar.
But not carbon-free nuclear!
And the nuclear-powered windmill, seen at a convention of environmentalists where the venue received electricity (to "turn" the windmill for demonstration purposes) from a nuclear plant.
Ed
Keep in mind that a whole era of Doble's development was essentially lost, in Germany in the 1930s. An equally enormous swath of Besler tech as late as the '50s (including Besler tubes and silent outboard motors for special-forces landings) is 'documented but not done'.
The SACA designs for the light Lamont-style boiler and the combination of Cyclone steam generator and supercritical motor remain highly interesting, if now largely anachronistic alternatives for practical steam. There are some fun possibilities now coming into view regarding hybrid powertrains...
Of course, many Teslas and prospective Nikolas and the like are actually steam cars and trucks, in the same sense that the French TGVs are practical nuclear-powered trains.
I crawled under a Doble at a car show in Michigan a few years ago- fascinating! While it was driving across the show field it was dead silent until the burner kicked on, then it sounded like a jet engine! An impressive piece of machinery and that's a fact. The guy there with it said that every Doble ever built is accounted for. Jay Leno has two, including Howard Hughes' roadster.
Even by the time of the Doble the significant part of firing delay was solved. One of the reasons for adoption of the tapered monotube, or other types of flash boiler, was the rapid start time including operating superheat -- under 30 seconds even in cold weather.
Anyone who thinks you started a gasolene car of that era in cold weather by 'turning a crank' has probably not tried it.
Stanleys used firetube boilers (albeit very strong ones with large convective heat-transfer area) with an overcritical-water reserve. Naturally those take longer to 'start' and feature relatively little radiant transfer.
The 'steam Land Rover' is basically novelty value, about as useful as a showman's engine fitted with road wheels. Sentinels are far better examples, and for demonstration of practical steam road cars in Australia see Ted Pritchard.
7j43kA Stanley did 127 MPH in 1906.
Stanley steamers were quite powerful, and they could hustle, no doubt about it.
But what killed them was the long wait time between fire-up and go. As Jay Leno says, they just couldn't compete with gasolene cars that you could just turn a crank (at first) to start. They were expensive too, compared to a Model T.
From there, I went over to Jay Leno's collection (3, I think) of Stanley Steamers on Youtube. Very interesting, of course.
A Stanley did 127 MPH in 1906.
Amtrak. Are you listening?
THAT is too cool for words! It's like a Land Rover built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel!
And don't you love the accents?
The hell with electric cars, I want me one of those!
This is awesome, no other word for it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DGtf7asP8I
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