Making the most of the power of steam
Steam engines came of age in the 18th century, so it’s not surprising that when the automobile emerged near the end of that century, steam was one of its power sources. While steam’s 150-year head start gave it a lead over the internal-combustion gasoline engine, there were disadvantages for automobiles.
Steam engines were usually heavier, more suitable for heavyduty or stationary applications. They required a skilled operator and time to generate steam. And there was fear of boiler explosion.
In spite of disadvantages, manufacturers like the Stanley brothers of Massachusetts, and White Company of Cleveland, Ohio, made successful steamers for many years.
But gasoline engines improved rapidly, a watershed development being Cadillac’s electric starter in 1912. By the 1920s, even Stanley, the most successful steamer, was going out of business.
Most considered this the end of steam automobiles, but they didn’t reckon with the persistence and ingenuity of Abner Doble, although it took him several tries to achieve satisfaction.
Born in 1895 in San Francisco, Doble demonstrated his technical abilities early. He built his first steam car while in high school and developed a lifelong passion for steam power.
Doble studied engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, and visited the Stanley plant in Newton, Massachusetts. He decided he could make a better steamer.
In 1912, Abner and brother John built their Model A powered by a two-cylinder, doubleaction, single-expansion steam engine mounted horizontally on the rear axle. Its condenser recovered all used steam, not just some as did the Stanley design. Condensing and re-using steam substantially reduced water consumption; the Dobles had built the most efficient steamer in America.
Doble left MIT in 1914 and established Abner Doble Motor Vehicle Co. in Waltham, Massachusetts. Although under-capitalized, he built five Model As and then designed the improved Model B, although it was not produced.
By 1915, that business was finished so Doble headed west to Detroit where he obtained financing to establish the General Engineering Co. to build his improved Model C Doble, a steamer so advanced it could be driven off in three minutes.
The Model C was enthusiastically received at the New York Automobile Show, and many orders flowed in. But technical problems and First World War steel priorities interrupted production. General Engineering was dissolved and Doble reorganized as Doble-Detroit. It built a few cars before he returned to California in 1919, taking a Doble Detroit with him.
In spite of the setbacks, Doble was still determined to pursue his steam car. In 1920 he and brothers John and Warren established Doble Steam Motors Corp., in San Francisco, later relocated to Emeryville, California.
After considerable development based on the Model D, Abner Doble’s dream steamer Series E, was ready in 1922. Production began in 1923 just as Stanley Motor Carriage Co. was dying.
With Series E, Doble attacked the essence of steam car problems: slow start-up time and constant adjustments required to keep the engine running. He ingeniously solved the messy and occasionally dangerous burner-lighting procedure by using two electric spark plugs to ignite a gun-type kerosene burner, similar to modern oil furnaces. This heated the tube-filled cylindrical boiler which was generating steam in about a minute.
The Model E was so efficient that it was said to run up to 2,415 kilometres on one 110-litre water tank.
Series E power came from a 3.5-litre four-cylinder engine with two high-pressure and two low-pressure cylinders. It developed 125 horsepower, and was mounted as a unit with the rear axle. The boiler was under the hood with the condenser in front like a gasoline car radiator.
Torque was estimated at a colossal 1,000 pounds-feet at zero rpm, the steamer’s low-speed torque giving it a substantial advantage over gasoline cars in acceleration and hill climbing.
Although the E Series was a big car with wheelbase of 3,607 millimetres and weight over 1,900 kilograms, the small engine could take it to 153 km/h and cruise at 120.
Abner envisioned the Doble as a truly luxurious car, not just a luxury steam car, in the order of Britain’s Rolls-Royce or Spain’s Hispano-Suiza. Its silver-spoke steering wheel, for example, was made of African ebony.
The Doble Series E was undoubtedly the finest steam car ever produced, but in spite of this probably only 30 to 40 were built over its eight-year production.
An advanced Model F was developed in the late 1920s, but the Doble company failed, victim of low sales, the Depression and stock manipulations of which the Dobles were unaware. Doble Steam Motors was liquidated in 1931, and Abner continued consulting on steam cars until his death in 1961.