Ross (steam automobile)

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Louis Ross racing his "Wogglebug" Stanley Woggle-Bug.jpg
Louis Ross racing his "Wogglebug"

The Ross was a brass era steam automobile built in Newtonville, Massachusetts from 1906 to 1909. [1]

Steam car an automobile powered by a steam engine

A steam car is a car (automobile) powered by a steam engine. A steam engine is an external combustion engine (ECE) where the fuel is combusted away from the engine, as opposed to an internal combustion engine (ICE) where the fuel is combusted within the engine. ECEs have a lower thermal efficiency, but it is easier to regulate carbon monoxide production.

Newtonville, Massachusetts village in Massachusetts

Newtonville is a village of Newton, Massachusetts.

Contents

Louis Ross

Company founder Louis S. Ross (1877–1927) gained national fame in the early 1900s while an employee of Stanley Motor Carriage Company racing his own-design and own-built [2] Stanley Steamer-powered "Wogglebug" race car at Ormond-Daytona Beach. [1]

Stanley Motor Carriage Company company

The Stanley Motor Carriage Company was an American manufacturer of steam-engine vehicles; it operated from 1902 to 1924. The cars made by the company were colloquially called Stanley Steamers, although several different models were produced.

Ross's "Wogglebug" was powered by two steam engines. It is said the two engines independently powered a rear wheel and they had separate speed controls. Difficult to control it would go down the course moving from side to side. Nevertheless at Daytona matched against W K Vanderbilt's new 90 hp Mercedes and a 90 hp Napier, Ross's "Wogglebug" won "the one-mile championship of the world" and the Dewar Trophy. [2]

Mercedes (marque) former brand of the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft


Mercedes was a brand of the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (DMG). DMG began to develop in 1900, after the death of its co-founder, Gottlieb Daimler. Although the name was not lodged as a trade name until 23 June 1902 and not registered legally until 26 September, the brand name eventually would be applied to an automobile model built by Wilhelm Maybach to specifications by Emil Jellinek that was delivered to him on 22 December 1900. By Jellinek's contract, the new model contained a newly designed engine designated "Daimler-Mercedes". This engine name is the first instance of the use of the name, Mercedes, by DMG. The automobile design would later be called the Mercedes 35 hp.

The Dewar Trophy was a cup donated in the early years of the twentieth century by Sir Thomas R. Dewar, M.P. a member of parliament of the United Kingdom (UK), to be awarded each year by the Royal Automobile Club of the United Kingdom "to the motor car which should successfully complete the most meritorious performance or test furthering the interests and advancement of the [automobile] industry".

He was one of the first American drivers to complete a mile course in under one minute. [1] In 1906 he gave up racing to turn his attention full-time to automobile manufacturing. [1] Ross closed his steam car business in 1911 and focused on the manufacture of torpedo signals used by railroads. On June 10, 1927 he was killed in an explosion while testing a new torpedo of his own design. [3]

Ross Steamer

The company produced a 25 hp two-cylinder, shaft-driven model [4] that was the first steam-powered car to have the boiler, engine, and tanks all up front under the hood. [1] The five-passenger touring car weighed 2800 pounds and cost $2800. [1]

Drive shaft mechanical component for transmitting torque and rotation

A drive shaft, driveshaft, driving shaft, tailshaft, propeller shaft, or Cardan shaft is a mechanical component for transmitting torque and rotation, usually used to connect other components of a drive train that cannot be connected directly because of distance or the need to allow for relative movement between them.

Boiler closed vessel in which water or other fluid is heated

A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, central heating, boiler-based power generation, cooking, and sanitation.

Engine machine designed to produce mechanical energy from another form of energy

An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one form of energy into mechanical energy. Heat engines burn a fuel to create heat which is then used to do work. Internal combustion engines are heat engines that burn fuel in a combustion chamber to extract work from the pressure of expanding gases. Electric motors convert electrical energy into mechanical motion; pneumatic motors use compressed air; and clockwork motors in wind-up toys use elastic energy. In biological systems, molecular motors, like myosins in muscles, use chemical energy to create forces and eventually motion.

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The Locomobile Company of America was a pioneering American automobile manufacturer founded in 1899, and known for its dedication to precision in the pre-assembly-line era. It was one of the earliest car manufacturers in the advent of the automobile age. For the first two years after its founding, the company was located in Watertown, Massachusetts. Production was transferred to Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1900, where it remained until the company's demise in 1929. The company manufactured affordable, small steam cars until 1903, when production switched entirely to internal combustion-powered luxury automobiles. Locomobile was taken over in 1922 by Durant Motors and eventually went out of business in 1929. All cars ever produced by the original company were always sold under the brand name Locomobile.

Grout (automobile)

Grout Brothers was a manufacturer of steam-powered automobiles in Orange, Massachusetts. The three brothers, Carl, Fred and C.B. were set up in business by their father William H., who had made sewing machines under the New Home name in partnership with Thomas H. White. The early cars were sold under the New Home name.

Mors (automobile) automobile manufacturer

The Mors automobile factory was an early French car manufacturer. It was one of the first to take part in automobile racing, beginning in 1897, due to the belief of the company founder, Émile Mors, in racing's technical and promotional benefits. By the turn of the century, automobile racing had become largely a contest between Mors and Panhard et Levassor.

Waltham Manufacturing Company

Waltham Manufacturing Company (WMC) was a manufacturer of bicycles, motorcycles, motorized tricycles and quadricycles, buckboards, and automobiles in Waltham, Massachusetts. It sold products under the brand names Orient, Waltham, and Waltham-Orient. The company was founded in 1893, moving to self-propelled vehicles after 1898.

Stevens-Duryea

Stevens-Duryea was an American manufacturer of automobiles in Chicopee Falls, Massachusetts, between 1901 and 1915 and from 1919 to 1927.

Abner Doble was an American mechanical engineer who built and sold steam-powered automobiles as Doble Steam Cars. His steam engine design was used in various automobiles from the early 1900s, including a 1969 General Motors prototype and the first successful steam-powered aeroplane.

Barley Motor Car Co. automobile manufacturer

Barley Motor Car Co. was a manufacturer of automobiles in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and Streator, Illinois. It manufactured the Roamer automobile (1916–29) and, briefly, the Barley (1922–24), and the Pennant (1924–25).

Rutenber Motor Company automobile manufacturer

The Rutenber Motor Company was established as the Rutenber Manufacturing Company in Chicago, Illinois, United States, to manufacture a four-cylinder engine to the design of Edwin Rutenber.

Detroit Auto Vehicle Company was a short-lived early automobile manufacturer established in the summer of 1904 with a capital stock of US$150,000. Based in Detroit in the old Detroit Novelty Machine Company building, it also had a foundry in Romeo, Michigan. It ceased operation in October 1907 following bankruptcy.

Michigan (1903 automobile) 1903 automobile

The Michigan was a pioneering brass era automobile built in Kalamazoo, Michigan by the Michigan Automobile Company from 1903 to 1908. It was one of the first vehicles that featured four-wheel-drive propulsion.

Straker-Squire automobile manufacturer

Straker-Squire was a British automobile manufacturer based in Bristol, and later Edmonton in North London.

History of steam road vehicles

The history of steam road vehicles comprises the development of vehicles powered by a steam engine for use on land and independent of rails, whether for conventional road use, such as the steam car and steam waggon, or for agricultural or heavy haulage work, such as the traction engine.

The Success Automobile Manufacturing Company was a brass era United States automobile manufacturer, located at 532 De Ballviere Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri, in 1906.

Black Motor Company automobile manufacturer

The Black was a brass era United States automobile, built at 124 East Ohio Street, Chicago, Illinois, in 1906.

Jackson Automobile Company

The Jackson Automobile Company was an American Brass Era automobile manufacturer located in and named for Jackson, Michigan. The company produced the Jackson from 1903 to 1923, as well as the 1903 Jaxon steam car and the 1904 Orlo.

At least 2 cars named Richmond were produced. The first was a steam car made by the Richmond Automobile Company in Richmond, Indiana from 1902 to 1903. The second was a car built by the Wayne Works in Richmond, Indiana from 1904 to 1917.

Waltham Steam

The Waltham Steam was an American steam car.

Bethlehem Motor Truck Corporation

The Bethlehem Motors Corporation was a manufacturer of tractors, automobiles and trucks in Allentown, Pennsylvania, between 1917 and 1926.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Kimes, Beverly Rae; Clark Jr, Henry Austin (1996). Standard Catalog of American Cars: 1805–1942. Iola, WI: Krause Publications. p. 1310. ISBN   978-0-87341-428-9.
  2. 1 2 Boiler Vroom, Motorsport magazine, April 2006, page 70
  3. ↑ "One Fatality and Several Persons Injured by Torpedoes". The Newton Graphic. June 17, 1927.
  4. ↑ Wise, David Burgess (2000). The New Illustrated Encyclopedia of Automobiles. Iola, WI: Quantum Publishing. p. 459. ISBN   0-7858-1106-0.

See also

Steam engine Heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid

A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force is transformed, by a connecting rod and flywheel, into rotational force for work. The term "steam engine" is generally applied only to reciprocating engines as just described, not to the steam turbine.

Steam power developed slowly over a period of several hundred years, progressing through expensive and fairly limited devices in the early 17th century, to useful pumps for mining in 1700, and then to Watt's improved steam engine designs in the late 18th century. It is these later designs, introduced just when the need for practical power was growing due to the Industrial Revolution, that truly made steam power commonplace.

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