A Doctored Stanley, We Presume?

The International Automobile Show, it is called, but it might also be known as the International Smog Machine Show. It is well known, of course, that the gasoline-powered car is the major polluter of U.S. air--a problem for which neither Washington nor Detroit has yet managed to find a solid solution. Short of reverting to the horse and buggy, the obvious answer is to develop a new propulsion system for automobiles that is as efficient as but less noxious than the internal-combustion engine. When the annual auto show opened in Manhattan last week, the Petersen Publishing Co. (Motor Trend, Hot Rod) gave visitors a look at a racy, wedge-shaped car that may signal just such a breakthrough in automotive design. Its source of power: steam.

Steam? Shades of yesteryear! Gliding silently down the streets of early 20th century America, the Stanley Steamer left a wake of admiring glances and a slight whiff of kerosene. Buffs still speak with awe of the day in 1907 when a streamlined Steamer literally left the ground during a Florida test, hitting a speed of nearly 200 m.p.h. Trouble was, the old steamers took half an hour to get the pressure up and used water at so prodigious a rate that they had to stop for refills every few miles. They also had bulky boilers that blew up from time to time. Those drawbacks, along with price (a Stanley Steamer cost $2,200 v. $360 for a gas-powered Ford Model T), were enough to drive them off the nation's highways.

Coiled Tubing. The new steamer, a brainchild of William Lear, developer of the Lear Jet, supposedly has none of the liabilities of the old. It is powered by an external-combustion motor (which burns fuel outside the cylinders), uses yards of coiled tubing instead of an old-fashioned steam boiler and a special chemical preparation (to prevent freezing) instead of water. The fluid is sealed in, so it can't boil away. It is superheated to vapor by a burner that, according to Lear, "can burn anything from ground camel dung to high-grade gasoline"--although he recommends kerosene.

A smaller second motor--a plain steam turbine--will power the car's auxiliary systems and cut the time required to fire the boiler to 15 seconds or so. Although Lear's car has not been road tested (the auxiliary motor is not completed), the main power plant has been "run in," and Lear claims that it can generate up to 500 h.p. More important, since the fuel used to fire the boiler is burned rather than exploded (as it is in a gas engine) the car will leave practically no products of incomplete combustion behind to pollute the air. Lear claims that the pollution produced by his engine will be "less than 1%" of that caused by an internal-combustion engine.

Governmental agencies have expressed interest in Lear's project; California wants to try out a steam-powered bus and police car. Lear also plans to enter a steamer in the Indianapolis 500, perhaps next year, to help get his message across to Detroit. In fact, there are signs that Detroit has got the message already. Ford has signed an agreement with Massachusetts' Thermo Electron Corp. for joint development of a small steam engine, and General Motors has contracted with Oakland's Besler Developments, Inc. to install a steam motor in a Chevrolet for testing.

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