Hey it's me, future Brian. Past Brian, you see that little star button on the after effects layers called "continually rasterise". Hit it so your drawings don't pixelate when scaled up.

Modern history is about human kind trying to find different ways to boil water.

As always, brilliant, and to me your best yet. Came into it ignorant; left way more clued up. Looking forward to the centripetal vs centrifugal video.

2:55 Turing a piston horizontally does not change how atmosphere if pressure affects it... Pressure acts in all directions equally... It only changes the part of the force intrigued by gravity

Well, Steam engine also revolutionize gaming industry. lol

I swear, engineers have the ability to take the most mundane solution to make batshit insane things

The wheel acts more like an inductor than a battery. Its the perfect analogy for an inductor if you ask me.

Its just so cool that one of your favorite channels makes a video about things your doing in school it just give me more motivation.

In your steam engine animation, the slide valve is positioned 180 degrees from the piston on the crankshaft. it should be positioned 90 degrees from the crank. Also, most steam engines use an eccentric to operate the valve, not a cam (or a crank, as shown in the animation).

finally a new video!!! quality - top notch and thank you and keep the hard work up!

Still waiting on that centripetal and centrifugal video 6 years later...

Thank you. We are planning on making a steam powered boat with my family, and this helps a lot. Thank you again.

thx for the vid, i checked out a few sites, but they were way too complex. This vid was simple enough for mee to understand, yet complex enough to make sure i knew enough about it. thx

the best thing is her unpredictability, one moment she can run soo smoothly her rhythmic noises are soothing then out of no where she can play up. slamming down with such force and you have to run over to the steam valve and shut her down while adjusting the pins and the weights on the piston till you find that sweet spot to return her to the point where she is happy. such temperament, such power and yet no matter how much you get frustrated by her, you love her all the same

love your work man, looking forward to the next one!

I'm building a steam engine as a "final exam" in my machining class at my technical college. To pass, it has to run for one minute on 200-300 psi. This gives me a better understanding of how it actually operates (I've only made one of the 23 pieces so far). Thanks for the video. :D

I cannot support you in Patreon for various reasons but I can totaly give you my like, subscribe and follow on your social networks. Nice videos man, I can imagine how much work each video needs to be so good. Keepup the good work mate, you're doing great!

So weird; my engineering class was just talking about steam engines. After watching this video, I understand it so much better now. This channel is pretty awesome :)

Two mistakes - the steam coming into the cylinder is at atmospheric pressure, it doesn't push the piston up. Rather it is drawn up by the beam being unbalanced and heavier on the pump side than the engine side. It's the relative vacuum formed by condensing the steam and atmospheric pressure acting on the opposite side of the piston that does the work of moving the piston. That's why it's called Newcomen's Atmospheric Engine. Second one is that atmospheric pressure works in all directions - the cylinder for the reciprocating engine could be in any orientation, but you wouldn't be able to drain the condensed water, so it has to be upright.

Where it all began. Still one of my favorite of your videos

Your content never ceases to amaze me.

Every good effort must be praised

This video was exactly what I was looking for. Thank you very much for taking the time to produce this.

How do you do your animations? Great video and explanation!

Great explanation. Please how did you do this animation? Or which software or tool did you use?

I feel like this isnt talked about enough, but the background music choice is always great.

thank you for this educational video helped a lot with one of my school presentations

Great effort and a wonderful understanding

2:45 - Simply putting the piston on its side DOESN'T remove the effect of atmospheric pressure. It's a good video otherwise though. I knew very little on how steam engines truly worked and this was quite informative.

Hi Brian, great video as always, can you tell me the name of the Background music (it's stuck in my head)? - Thanks so much.

Awesome video. Seems like the cam lift and crankshaft stroke would have to have some kind of ratio. Do you know what that is ? If the crankshaft stroke was too long or too short it seems like the control valve wouldn't be open at the right time.

Great video with a clear explanation!

Hello Brian, love your videos, and that’s why I make this comment. At 2:44 you say “We have turned this piston’s cylinder on its side, so atmospheric pressure can no longer force the piston back down, so we need to use steam on the return stoke. This requires a control valve, to control when the stream enters and leaves each side of the cylinder”. Atmospheric pressure can push against the piston in ANY direction IF you have an open cylinder. Did you mean to say that gravity can’t force the piston back? And you don’t have to use steam on the return stroke, if you have a flywheel (it does add to the power). A big shift in steam power evolution at time 2:44 I think was going from an atmospheric pressure power stroke, to a steam pressure power stroke. Anyways; most of what you say is correct, and clear, and I appreciate that. I now see that I’m not the first person to call your attention on this. Ok, keep up the good work!

Incredible video the control valve for the return stroke how you animated it helped me understand. Thank you. Subed

Marvelous platform to learn what actual Engineering is..

I have been reading lately about CHP plants, and I have been wondering if it would be possible to convert the heat produced by a CHP unit into electricity using some kind of steam device. Would this be a good or bad use of the heat produced by a CHP unit?

2:50 The effect of atmospheric pressure is unrelated to the piston's orientation. Air also pushes sideways. This is Pascal's principle.

I should sleep but I don't want to stop learning more and more... wish I could learn while sleeping

Great! Love how you came in from a very big-picture perspective and grounded it. How do you make these amazing animations? What package do you use?

Always great videos. I would have likes a bit more details about how the steam circulates, and what are the steam temperature values in the advanced engines, but this introduction is already very nice. Just a minor comment, wouldn't it be better to imagine flywheel as a mechanical capacitor instead of a battery? Capacitors are exactly for this when converting AC to DC current.

Cool to see how may different steam engines are out there. Wonder how many times they fail before they got one to work.

This channel is a gem for engineers :)

Many people seem to forget that steam power is still one of the most used ways to generate power. It just uses different types of heat sources and the designs changed drastically. Even nuclear power is just nuclear fission heating up water to power turbines.

Very cool video! One question: How / With what program have you created the animations?

The claim that the 1712 Newcomen engine's piston was raised by pressurized steam is completely wrong. The piston was raised by the weight of the pump rod and pump plunger. As it rose, it DREW steam (at essentially atmospheric pressure) from the boiler into the piston chamber. Then cold water was sprayed into the piston, condensing the steam and creating a vacuum. The differential pressure between the atmosphere outside the piston and the vacuum inside the piston forced down the piston, causing the pump to operate. At the bottom of the stroke, the pump rod had been raised back up and it's weight was ready to pull the piston back up. The first pressurized steam engines were not developed until about 1799 by Richard Trevithick, with others also being given credit for working on the idea at about that same time. This was almost a century after Newcomen invented his engine.

Holy shit why did I sleep on this video it's exactly what I needed

can you please tell me what formula have you used for creating the return crank (crank slider with an offset)?

Clearly understood and brilliant.

your channel is awesome, subbed

Awesome vid What I was looking for

thank you so much for this. Really helped

great video m8! you did get the control valve timing wrong in the animation. you put it at roughly 180 degrees from the piston crank but its supposed to be 90 degrees.

The most interesting part in this whole video is actually the flywheel. Never knew stuff like that. Cool

Great video! Accessible but still full of technical goodness. Only criticism is that you introduced the PV diagram really quickly and didn't explain how it worked. The discussion of inefficiencies and history of overcoming them was really interesting.

Little technical mistakes in the final animation drive me crazy as a perfectionist

Please make more videos describing industrial revolution technology like this.

Wow watching an older video of yours really shows how much your oratory skills increased through the years.

Great explanation and graphics Thanks

great details thanks Brian

I cannot understand a word. You’ve come a long way.

Good stuff and keep it coming if you can.

It's a nice video. But I'm sure someone had mentioned before. The gate position that changes where steam enters and exits should have the linkage rotated 90° counterclockwise

Love your vids. I hope you and Destin collaborate.

Question: so where does the steam go after passing through the cylinder?

now I understand why creativity can be sometimes stronger than intelligence

Hey everyone. Hope you liked the video. I'm planning to do a Q/A at some point, so if you have any questions please send me a tweet. My username is fiosracht.

Great video! Thanks for the education.

I would love an expanded and updated version of this video. Or even one dedicated to steam and all it's many uses. You could make it Nebula only...

Can you provide reference link on this? I want to further study on this subject thanks

Is it possible to build one of these strictly on stuff in the wild? (Wood, twigs, clay etc)

who in the world would dislike these great videos?

great video. i had no idea what a flywheel was for

Great video. Without meaning to be to critical there are a few small thing I would point out. In the Newcomen engine the steam does no work and is at a very low pressure, about 15psi I think. It was actually the weight of the pump rods that pulled the piston up as much as it was the steam. Hence it makes sense to have a vertical cylinder. The main thing that changed and really sparked of the industrial revolution was James Watt's invention of using high pressure or strong steam as he called it. This was as a result of the advances in engineering technologies, both making it possible to build boilers up to a higher pressure and more complex machinery to tighter tolerances. Watt came up with some very important inventions which made his engine much more efficient such as his parallel motion, separate condenser, crank and flywheel. The difference with the separate condenser as opposed to the atmospheric engine is that it's only reducing the pressure the steam is working against instead of providing the power.

Watching this while high hits different

Where's the vid on the centrifugal governor? Can't find it on your channel.

I can't believe the amount of people that think centrifugal force is fake.

extremely well explained

That flywheel demo with the solenoid engine was brilliant. Where did you locate that?

keeping the video short but not omitting necessary details is perfect..

what do you use for the animation the name of the app ???

Please discuss Stirling engines someday.

SG: I think he confuses gravity with atmospheric pressure. FM: Isn't atmospheric pressure caused by gravity? SG: He says that the piston works against Atmospheric Pressure. In both cases (vertical and horizontal) that is not the case as the inside of the piston does not have a pressure less than Atmospheric Pressure. The water cooling in the first case causes condensing of the vapour reducing the 'gas content' and thus a sort of vacuum is created causing it to fall down faster than normal condensing would do. Also he says that in the case of the horizontal cylinder Atmospheric Pressure does not act anymore because it is tilted. It is the weight of the piston (head) that is removed out of the equation in this case (if we neglect friction).

2:46 i don’t understand, to me it seems that you made a mistake, you said you put the cylinder on its side and the atmosphere pressure can no longer force the piston back down? It is the pressure difference not the specific placement of the cylinder that cause it to retract. Please explain if you think you are right!

ingenious, i wish there were some simulator i could use to make my own steam contraptions

Which software is used for illustrating steam engine? In video???

This really is the first video on youtube which explains steam engines really well, but I've a question, what does the centrifugal governor do? You could of explained it in the video.

Nice video, but atmospheric preseure not working when the assembly is mounted horizonatlly? That is inaccurate. Does you body only feel pressure from one direction?

Amazing channel!! ....Thank you

So after you add a separate condenser: at the top of the 'stroke' the condenser is opened and the steam can escape into a cooler chamber thus creating a vaccum which pulls the piston down which then opens a valve letting in high pressure steam . . . . . i know it sounds odd but i never really understood what "added a seperate condenser" actually meant until i saw WHERE it was added and how it worked: now i get it. The only other machine action i dont understand is the OTHER end of a Newcommen steam engine: how is the water actually raised out of the mine? Is it suction? A chain of buckets? If you know of a good video showing what happens id really appreciate it.

Wow finally ! I always tald myself the centrifugal force doesn't exist, despite never being told so, and you're confirming my thoughts.

Thanks! This video help me with my study about termical machines. I'm studing it in my course.

I was thinking about how the steam engine works! When Im on my way to work! And when I parked! KZfaq emailed me ur video because I subscribe email notifications from u! Hahahha what a coincidence! xD i was like! They burn goal to boil the water so the steam comes what! But how the pistons go up and down!? It takes time to cool down! And now I know the answer! Thank u!

What softwares did you use to create this video?

Make a video of James Watts new and improved steam engine and it’s impact on the industrial revolution

Good job! A lot of info in a short period of time! Thank you!

wouldnt the space in the combustion chamber taken up by the rod connected to the piston on the right side but not the left cause a difference in torque from each side's stroke

What you said about atmospheric pressure is wrong. You are confusing gravity with atmospheric pressure.

Great videos, I didn't hesitate to subscribe.

dude i love your videos!

cool video, you definitely earned a sub