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Steam
and Diesel Train Engines "All aboard!" Have you ever ridden on a train before?
Did you know that The first successful steam locomotive was built by Richard Trervithick in 1804. As the steam locomotive improved, more railroads
started to use But steam was a far cry from the luxuries of diesels and steam locomotive manufacturers knew that. They started to streamline their locomotives to make them look modern. Of course the streamlining didn't make the locomotive operate any better, but it did help the locomotive's image. Rudolph Diesel, inventor of the diesel engine, was born in Paris, France in The diesel locomotive was invented in the 1890's by Rudolph Diesel. By 1925, the diesel locomotive started to hit the rails. A diesel engine is a lot like a car engine; in fact it can be used in tractors, cars, trucks and many other pieces of machinery. The one difference between the internal-combustion engine that runs on gasoline and the diesel engine is that a diesel engine ignites the fuel without a spark. This happens when the piston in the engine compresses the air in the cylinder, and it gets hot. When the fuel is sprayed into the cylinder, it ignites forcing the piston to move. In a diesel-electric locomotive the diesel engine turns a generator. The generators send the power to the wheels. The electricity from the generator runs a motor which turns the wheels. The diesel locomotive started taking over steam in the 1950's. Some advantages diesels have over steam are that: diesels are cleaner, they don't need as much repair, they don't need to refuel as often as steam, and finally they are more powerful than steam. It might have taken two steam engines to haul a heavy train where one diesel can handle that train very well. Citations Books Stone, Lynn M. Steam Locomotives. Vero Beach: The Rourke Corporation, 1999. Electronic Media "Rudolph Diesel-Inventor of the Diesel Engine" Inventors. 14 January 2005 <http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bldiesel.htm> Images Permission to use photograph of horse drawn train and Rudolph Dielsel is granted under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page>. Photograph of a steam engine from Paris France has been released into the public domain under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page>. Photograph of steam train from Japan is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/. Photograph © Ian Ruxton. Copyrighted animated train at top of page from "Microsoft Office Online" <http://office.microsoft.com/clipart/default.aspx?lc=en-us&cag=1> (October-March, 2004-2005). Clip art available only to licensed users for non-commercial purposes. |Automobiles| |Steam and Diesel Train Engines| |Horse Drawn Carts| |Camel Trains| |History of Bicycles| |Bicycles| |Omnibuses| |School Bus Safety| |Taxicabs| |The Subway or Metro| |Snowshoes| |Snowmobiles| |Traffic Lights Around the World| |How a Motorcycle Works| |Bullet Trains| |Maglev Trains| |The Chunnel| |The Autobahn| |Amphibious Vehicles| |Bus Ride Slideshow| |Taxi Ride Slideshow| |
the very first trains were pulled by horses? That all changed with
the invention of two locomotives that have ruled the rails for decades. So climb aboard as we ride the rails and discover the magical world of trains.
1858. He graduated at Munich Polytechnic to become a refrigerator engineer. Diesel always loved engine design and wanted to create an internal-combustion engine that would not need a spark to ignite the fuel.
Diesel operated his first successful engine in 1897 and dubbed it "The Diesel Engine."