DIY Micro Steam Powerplant

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In this video I'll use a steam turbine to generate electricity using a BLDC motor as a generator to create 3-phase alternating current. The turbine is machined from a brass block, with a 2" x 2" x 1" housing and 46mm diameter / 19mm wide rotor. As a nozzle, it has a 1mm orifice. The steam is generated by a flash boiler that's heated with a propane flame and fed from a pressurized water tank. A unique feature about this boiler design is that the feedwater pressurization comes from the propane fuel.
The boiler evaporates approximately ~1 gram/sec of water, meaning it's absorbing about 2.6 kW of heat. The generator puts out a peak power of 17 watts, making it 0.65% efficient in a best case. In reality, a large portion of the heat is probably lost to the surroundings instead of heating the boiler, so the efficiency is probably even less than that. The average steam pressure right before the nozzle exit was about 60 psi (~4 bar) for the tests in this video.
Huge losses were probably caused by the relatively large gaps between the turbine rotor and the housing wall. Also, the lack of a converging-diverging nozzle is probably another source of inefficiency, but I don't think I currently have the ability to machine one at such a small scale. The burner itself was probably drawing in much more air than was neccesary for combustion, meaning a large volume of air was probably just acting as a parasitic load on the burner.
The power output of this thing was pretty small, but large enough to charge a phone / tablet or power a small radio, which could actually make it useful in an emergency if nothing else was available.
The idea for this turbine is a development on some compressed-air turbine designs i experimented with in two videos published in 2022:
• 3d Printed Compressed ...
• Comparing Turbine Rotors
Machining this thing out of metal was a lot of work, so maybe if i make a future video on steam turbines, I'll try one of those Tesla Turbine things, since those just require a big stack of thin plates.

[@ogiego298]

using the propane to pressurise the water feels like a CSB investigation waiting to happen.

[@dsfs17987]

added benefit of using propane to pressurize water is when you run out of water, you can start generating some real power, for a while... 😁

[@testboga5991]

*for a while*

[@Gunbudder]

put your propane bottle in a big bucket of tap water. it will thermally stabilize the tank and prevent any freezing. the bigger the bucket, the more thermally stable it will become. usually though just a 5 gallon bucket of tap water is fine. it will provide super consistent gas pressure from the tank at any discharge rate. although if you go just full bore open, the nozzle itself will start to freeze and you will need to wrap it in a soaked towel to keep it from freezing

[@seanscon]

Freeze guy is back

[@Jupiter-rs4zl]

Where?

[@multiarray2320]

*Boil guy is back

[@ThylineTheGay]

@@multiarray2320 state change guy is back

[@B0BBYL33J0RD4N]

A way that you might be able to mess with tolerances could be spray paint. Add a layer, see if it is better. Add another layer, see if it is better. Would have to get some heat resistant paint, and would want to point it at something that isn't going to die when a paint chip inevitably cascades into all of the paint coming off and out the end of the tube in .01 seconds as a shrapnel cannon, but is plenty well within the safety level of the rest of the channel.

[@justinpower8232]

Adding the coil increases the pressure drop of the water, decreasing the flow. Your water flow was most likely significally under the 1g/s you measured at first. You also need to take into account the steam pressure at the exit point, which lowers your pressure differential. So your efficiency is higher than calculated! To get the real flow rate, you need to test the circuit with the coil and with an output container at a pressure close to the steam pressure!

[@connordow7366]

I second this.

[@justinpower8232]

Alternatively, he could also condense the steam exiting the turbine to measure the flow rate, which would be much simpler

[@montey1017]

Industrial power gen guy here. 2 kinds of turbine plants, single stage and multi stage. Single stage turbines burn just the gas. Literally a reconfigured airplane or helicopter motor, with a shaft output. Multi stage units will have multiple turbines on one shaft, with couplings between them. The first stage burns the gas, then boils water, used in the other turbines. Hydrogen cooled windings in the alternator, power plant type stuff.

[@Xsiondu]

Oh papi! Tell me more about hydrogen cooled windings in the alternator. You know how I love it

[@Xsiondu]

But seriously that sounds really interesting I would love to hear more

[@anon-means-anon]

These are exactly the type of projects that seem to grab my interest as well. I'm constantly making something horrendously inefficient and mostly useless, but it's fun and I learn a lot.

[@yamm7937]

unpredictable and informative. just what i like

[@Palerider1942]

If you do more Steam stuff, move away from brass. the steam leeches the zink from th ebrass making the material brittle and porus and also puts zinc into the exhaust gases... Bronze is a good option to use if you dont want to do straight copper

[@HL65536]

Some simple efficiency optimizations: Converging diverging nozzle-like optimization can be done quite easily: just use a cone shape at the end, it's not the perfect shape but a lot better than a hole. The size is easy to calculate: the pressure ratio is equal to the flow area ratio, e.g. 9 bar -> 1 bar means outer diameter is 3x hole diameter. Next point of optimization is the boiler flow direction: steam exit should be on the flame side, water input should be at the exhaust side. This acts as a heat exchanger and extracts more heat from the flame. The turbine exhaust can further be used to pre-heat the water in another heat exchanger. Test the steam output temperature, it should be a lot higher than 100°C, this also increases efficiency. Add a bit of insulation onto the flame pipe. Maybe even put another tube around it and let the combustion air run through it to pre-heat it. For the schottky diodes, you should use bigger ones and have them run hot ~100°C. That makes them way more efficient.

[@TheOriginalEviltech]

You seem to know your stuff quite well! What do you do for work/fun so you are this well informed?

[@HL65536]

@@TheOriginalEviltech I am a black hole sucking up endless STEM knowledge. I like watching 2 hours deep dive videos into some technical subject and remember most of it. Just don't ask me to remember people's names...

[@MSP_TechLab]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="80">1:20</a> that's why I always laugh when in the movie someone jumps in steam locomotive, throws a match in the firebox, and make it run immediately 😊

[@GerinoMorn]

Now that I think of it I'm sure Americans tried it in the 50s, but what if instead of a furnace we just exposed a nuclear fuel rod to the water in boiler... XD

[@user60521123]

The rotor should’ve been turned on a lathe first to ensure it will spin smoothly. Very interesting project! Very creative design!!

[@stewiex]

That was fan flippingtastic . It would be cool to see you try this again, but make the boiler and its components fit with inside a barbecue propane tank which is no larger, in fact, smaller than most household owned generators. There is also a method for generating steam using a solid metal core with holes drilled all over it to a certain depth which fits inside a tight tolerance pipe with water coming in one cap and out the other that will generate steam extremely efficiently. It would be neat if you could adapt this to a wind turbine to generate your steam instead of using propane . Perhaps some of the wasted steam potential could be captured with an air compressor to use that as your air pressure source. Keep up the awesome work with these really cool projects.

[@SkippiiKai]

One correction: Mosfets are in their linear region when they are saturated. The earlier region is called the ohmic region. With BJTs, the first region is called linear, then they go into saturation. Mosfets decrease their resistance roughly linearly during their ohmic region when you use then as a power sink, then don't change much in their saturated region where it's pretty flat, called the linear region. Yes, I know it's stupid and confusing. No, I have no idea what the regions are called for IGBTs because I gave up learning the correct terminology after I learned this stupid fact about Mosfets. Now I just make up my own words like "Flat line" and "Y=mx+b region"

[@Xsiondu]

I support the IGBT community

[@CollectiveSoftware]

You just never know what you're going to get with this guy except that it's going to be awesome and dangerously inadvisable

[@TheOriginalEviltech]

Invert the heating coil. You need the hottest part to be in contact with the steam to superheat it. Also insulate the burn pipe so all the heat stays in, and you only lose heat from the exhaust. You already know what to do with the turbine. Wind the heating coil on a piece of flat bar so the coils swirl and force all the hot gasses from the burner to swirl as much as possible and to deliver as much as possible heat to the steam.

[@ansgaryeysymontt7155]

Check out organic rankine cycle. It is sort of low temperature steam engine in which instead of water you use some refrigerant which is easier to seal and you can get it running at pretty much any temperatures given you have enough delta T for any carnot efficiency. I think positive displacement vane turbine is way to go - some car ac compressors can be converted for turbine use - only issue is lack of vane springs but you can feed some gas inside vane slots to spread them for initial seal because once it is running centrifugal force will take care of it. Smaller issue is need to pump liquid refrigerant at pressure higher than high side pressure - this looks like modified gear pump job.

[@nathanvanblommestein4316]

There's also lots of lost heat energy. You could collect the stem and use some kind of heat pump to pre heat the tank

[@tomattore]

This is the next level of a scientific entertainment content. My respect to you, sir!

[@AllanDeal]

Next episode a steam powered electrical generator for a monorail fridge carriage

[@xacttoeblade]

dont tease us..

[@Ammoniummetavanadate]

You can make the vanes out of bearing bronze and then add some steam formulated lubrication oil to keep everything moving.

[@SkylerLinux]

Tesla Turbine would work very well with this micro steam powerplant

[@Mozartenhimer]

Making your heat exchanger counter flow, so that the hot steam is closest to the flame would increase efficiency.

[@josephschlesinger411]

You can virtually eliminate the diode voltage drop by using a full wave synchronous rectifier. That’s literally the mosfet circuit to drive it (but in reverse).

[@JonathanZigler]

You may get a better efficiency with a higher efficiency rectifier. You also might have had better luck with some bjts in a negative feedback config to create a stable voltage rail to minimize losses of the voltage dividers.

[@b3dubbs72]

You could add stages to your turbine to harness the residual pressure on the outlet. Also, increasing the turbine shaft diameter would be ideal and so would decreasing the weight of the turbine itself and optimizing the blades.

[@turboimport95]

nice bro, I got hella suggestion to make this way better!! Use a turbocharger as the turbine, It can soak up as much heat and spin as high as you want to go, On top of that route the wasted steam exhaust around the metal pipe to preheat the pipe, using less fuel to heat it up. you can connect a shaft to the turbo exhaust turbine wheel to spin the generator. Max Efficiency!!

[@TobiasKornmayer]

Maybe try a multistage pressurized grinder setup next? Maybe one into two, mechanically belt linked for overexpansion?

[@mafiosomax7423]

I would really like to see you having a go at that reciprocating piston engine. That would also be a challenge if you are faced with inconsistent steam pressure.

[@sethcain7434]

This dude loves capillary tubes!

[@TheBaumLord]

Great new project. I think the water vapor cone indicating underexpansion is not the worst thing about that. That cone being visible at all indicates to me that your steam is getting too cold before exiting the turbine, greatly reducing pressure and effiency.

[@edwardscott3262]

The vanes you were talking about are fiber reenforced phenolic resin. They should be able to deal with steam well.

[@andrewharbit7449]

I do like the fact your using flash steam,I have a concept drawn up for using a rotor with exhaust ports at an angle

[@MiguelAbd]

Multidisciplinary projects are amazing, but especially so when made by one guy. The videos starts as a mechanical engineering course, and then turns into electrical engineering haha

[@bwobbles2368]

Always excited when I get a new video notification from you! Excellent videos, both educational and funny, I have actually put many pieces of info gained from these videos to use.

[@sdjhgfkshfswdfhskljh3360]

Improving efficiency of this generator may be interesting topic to explore.

[@pistonsjem]

you can reuse old hard drive platter for a tesla turbine. For the tolerance issue. machine it oversize and use drill + sandpaper lol

[@kevinmerrell9952]

Excellent sardonic presentation. Bravo!

[@Mis73rRand0m]

Most modern engines use a variable vane oil pump with metal dividers, and even have variable housing geometry that could help dial in chamber pressures for efficiency across multiple RPM ranges or input pressures. Look at the Chevy LS pumps for the most available solution - they are somewhat self contained as well.

[@Mis73rRand0m]

There are standalone variable oil pumps for industrial use all over the internet for cheap, and honestly look perfect based on some cursory searches. - keyed shaft and even water cooled so you could use the turbine itself to pre heat feed water before it hits the boiler.

[@brett8090]

Your content is so nerdy. Keep up the great work!

[@ValugaTheLord]

you need to do stages! Add more turbines this will make it more efficient.

[@francisorr2189]

The veins in those rotors at the end are made out of phenolic and can survive temperatures in excess of 400 Fahrenheit

[@DanBowkley]

Off the shelf air tools would be a perfect cheap donor for a vane motor...couple bucks at your favorite Chinesium Emporium should get you running pretty efficiently.

[@arnauguillaumes8287]

Im nostalgic of the cryo series. love anyway jaja

[@lucasvisser3864]

You could try making a tesla turbine for this. It'd probably be easier to cut thin metal disks with good tolerance.

[@TheMookie1590]

when you first powered it, sounded like marge screaming

[@GamingCraftTeam]

I would recommend you to use Steel and please do give a Stepper motor a go those things can do alot for voltage increase

[@waltonchan3931]

Try making a pressurized Stirling engine! The NASA radioactive stirling power sources are an engineer’s heaven, but there’s not much similar (although non-radioactive) hobby work on YT.

[@expolarity7541]

A highly informative and entertaining video about random machinery? I'm in

[@daysejones968]

Doc, Freeze should take better care of their hands. Every new video I see a new injury. Stay safe man

[@GerinoMorn]

"...it probably sounds crazy" yes, but this is maker YT, we're expecting as much

[@tullgutten]

Thinking you should try restricting the water flow a lot so it's only translucent steam comming out. Now you waste a lot just spitting semi cold water out. Less water and the same or less flame but get it much hotter

[@EricT01]

Hi, I'm from 2048 trying restart civilization. Thank god I had this video saved up.

[@dvrs-e6t]

As you already have access to a 3D printer, it might be worth looking into Axial Flow turbines. Might improve efficiency

[@balajimundhe763]

that's so efficient man !

[@briancox2721]

The boiler could also be described as a water tube boiler with superheat.

[@harrylenon9594]

When you are explaning your electronic load model, you have your graph slightly wrong. The graph is drain current agains Voltage from drain to source(Vds). In the linear region, the current is directly proportional to the voltage from drain to source (essentially a resistor) the flat part of the curve is the saturation region, where the current is no longer proportional to voltage across the fet. The change in gate voltage (Vgs) is shown by the different lines on the same graph. You probably are never in the linear region when using the fets as a current sink like this

[@Kitsaplorax]

The image for the video looks like the box from Hellraiser.

[@R.Daneel]

The motor rating is Kv (K sub V) not kV as shown. A minor thing, but since motors can involve both units , it helps to be pedantic. Also, what happens if you drain your water supply? Aren't you then pumping propane through your heated coil. How big of a deal is that? I'm thinking not THAT bad. Isn't that basically a BBQ burner?

[@atrumluminarium]

Try a Tesla turbine or put more stages of your current design to capture more energy from the steam

[@Mwwwwwwwwe]

Seems like your turbine has high flow of steam but low Maybe injecting the steam with a .2mm stainless 3d printer nozzle would help build pressure?

[@saatsazov]

Flash is alive!

[@two_number_nines]

nylon and polycarbonate would be overkill materials for a steam turbine at those pressures/tolerances

[@odbo_One]

I wonder if air powered grinder would be a good substitute for the turbine build. I have an old one laying around I could try.

[@TheNerd484]

I cannot comprehend how you would choose CATIA as your cad software of choice when there exist cad softwares that don't drive you insane using them. Is that how you get inspiration for your projects?

[@olagarto1917]

its better to use the propane tank just as a starter and them recicle the passed steam to a secund water tank that is smaller an will quiclily expand and generatepreassure to expel the main tank. recirculating waist steam everywhere should grant a nice eficiency boost and recude fuel consumptiom

[@sans6924]

driving 4 answers made a video about the potential of vane ENGINES, im pretty sure it can withstand steam.

[@Lettu-]

Cool project! I wonder if u could use pneumatic tools as the turbine. Don't know if they are any more efficient though :D

[@The.Heart.Unceasing]

you could try chaining turbines to get more energy out of the steam ?

[@SpartanONegative]

Excellent 👍 Thank you for sharing with us 🙏 God Bless

[@brett567]

Them vanes are usually cast iron

[@Angel_the_Bunny]

So the efficiency and power output suck, like really suck but the cnc, electronics and build are cool as hell. Even with such a dreary result this is a wicked cool project! It would be cool to see how much chemical energy you could convert to electrical at this scale. Like set an amount of propane to consume and see how high you could get the output through iterative improvements.

[@iNcog_AoE]

babe wake up

[@smug_cat1]

I'm up

[@mateuszgezakowski5442]

old steam power plants spray the steam with cold water at the steam outlet of the turbine so the steam collapses and forms a very strong vacuum. It makes the turbines a lot more powerful because you are basically adding a atmosphere of difference. The fun thing is you don't even need a pump to do that the vacuum itself pulls in water so only thing you need to do is jump start the process and then regulate the flow. Also tesla turbine is very easy to machine, its only a few flat disks and a housing and works with stem if you preheat it so maybe you should try that.

[@TheOriginalEviltech]

He needs a pump to pump out the cooled water and steam.

Didn't you make a mistake at <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="1080">18:00</a>? How would you have an output voltage without a load? As I understand it, it is the speed that gets reduced due to excessive load, and that in turn means less power is generated.

[@niemam5825]

I think, in near future You will not use propane torch to generate steam. I think You plan to use... "elements" :D

[@psxtuneservice]

Instead of the gas we could use some spent uranium fuel rods.

[@WOFFY-qc9te]

An alternative to a propane boiler you cold use and in induction coil. The coil itself is the inductor and you can regulate the eddy current with an iron slug. Great project.

[@vilkillian]

won't propane at those pressures dissolve into water? the resulting steam will contain eiter highly flammable fumes, or a propane aerosol, which is even worse, you'd need to make a close cycle system to recover water and propane

[@xyzero1682]

Fun stuff. I'd love to see a turbine made with smelted bronze into a ceramic shell-cast mold formed off a 3D print, ala FarmCraft101's Dogecoin video. Also, a better boiler tube with insulation wrapped around it.

[@tomholroyd7519]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="1089">18:09</a> The perfect inverted U curve

[@AureliauGTaskas]

Now do a collab with integza and make a hydrogen-powered rocket engine

[@DudeManDude-ot5fv]

What if you made a steam generator that was under vacuum? Less energy to boil the water = higher efficiency?

[@MahBor]

Will you ever continue the transistor computer series?

[@NoahKapustic]

The "ptfe" veins look like pieces of phenolic

[@killsalot78]

I wonder if the turbine was just too small for the amount of steam being fed in, having a wider diameter should give the steam more time to expand no?

[@kilesprofit8917]

hell yeah, cant wait to do some hyperspace piracy

[@TheHom3er]

while it might be a terrible idea, I wonder if you'd generate more power if you just feed the propane directly into your turbine..?

[@hackedbyBLAGH]

Are you able to use a large cylinder of compressed air, and a heating cylinder to increase the air pressure using the propane?

[@MaxQ10001]

Interesting and entertaining video! I was surprised of the efficiency. I guessed around 5%. It really show the importance of precision engineering and machining. It would be very interesting to see how much this could be improved with "home lab" equipment. Is it possible to reach 10 or 20%?

[@Emu0181]

Second stage turbine

[@windigo000]

it's something.

[@Cor_Netto]

Maybe try a tesla turbine?

[@tomholroyd7519]

I need a t-shirt with a 3-phase rectifier diagram on it, to show to Electroboom

[@BeesKneesBenjamin]

Cool

[@sleeptyper]

Run the coil twice - from up to down against the flame - to make superheated steam?

[@Ziraya0]

Would it make sense to chain on more turbines, or in this setup would the increased exit resistance reduce flow through the early turbines?

[@putinslittlehacker4793]

Wait a 3D printed cnc machine. Can we get a video on that?

[@vlastimilhrasny1870]

Lots of people don't have a cnc at their disposal

[@N1ghtR1der666]

great video, but the huge white space background of these diagrams was very uncomfortable to watch fyi