Yesterday's Tommorow: A Plausible Roman Steam TL

[VictorLaszlo]

Originally Posted by DonMegel

Ah, but how to you turn the screw?

Animal (oxen, as, donkey), wind (windmill) or water (watermill) power were all used for both irrigation and drainage purposes from antiquity onwards. Human labour was used far less often since it was more expensive, even if you had slaves there were other more profitable tasks they could be used for than something wind or water would do for free and beasts of burden for a fraction of the price.

[carlton_bach]

Originally Posted by Ofaloaf

edit: General question. Anybody know what, if any, units of measurement Romans or Greeks used for temperature?

None. They could not measure temperature. There were a number of words used to designate heat or cold, of course. It is very likely that the technical vocabulary we have for cooking temperatures had its equivalent in other fields (smiths can provide descriptive instructions for heating metal that give you a very narrow temperature range if you know what you're doing). But there were no thermometers in the ancient world.

[DonMegel]

Originally Posted by Elfwine

I don't know if Nero is the man, but as for Hero(n) and "What if he had other designs?"

I'll put it this way: Why would the least efficient and least practical version of his designs survive, when a practical-at-the-time steam engine design would be something not dependent on being saved on some crumbling scroll in the Library?


Also:
Steam engines are vulnerable to blowing up (yay steam pressure!). And I'm not sure that the design suggested here isn't even more vulnerable - which is going to be a major deterrent.

And that, of course, is if it works reliably at what it's supposed to do - a serious concern for OTL early designs, and that this TTL has an easier time just doesn't ring right.

Sophocles play, Odeipus Rex, which is widely regarded as one of the best Greek tragidies ever written, came in second place when he submitted it to a contest. The first place play has been lost to history. Just because somthing is good does not mean it will survive 2,000 years of record.

Reliability, ofcourse, is a concern, but so far in my TL has not been an issue because no one is using steam engines, just Palonius. Presumably, if it breaks wile he is using it, he can fix it.

Originally Posted by VictorLaszlo

Animal (oxen, as, donkey), wind (windmill) or water (watermill) power were all used for both irrigation and drainage purposes from antiquity onwards. Human labour was used far less often since it was more expensive, even if you had slaves there were other more profitable tasks they could be used for than something wind or water would do for free and beasts of burden for a fraction of the price.

Correct, which is why Palonius' irrigation system does not catch on. Vesspasian only asked if he could do it and he did, but as I mentioned, it was not practicle.

Originally Posted by Ofaloaf

Even if someone did come up with the idea of using separate water flues within the boiler to increase steam production, the aforementioned lack of knowledge of air pressure, combined with the lack of knowledge regarding the strength of various metals under pressure (info needed to answer the question "how thick does this boiler have to be?") means that odds are good that whoever first experiments with flues is going to be blown up.

I mean, you've basically skipped over the century-and-a-half of all the smart guys in Europe faffing about in various royal societies and salons and accumulating all the ideas and all the barebones data needed just for a Frenchman to invent a pressure cooker.

I love the idea of Rome steaming up, but there's a huge chasm between the aeolipile and a workable industrial steam engine, and having a few emperors throw money and patronage around isn't going to bridge a gap that took all of Europe centuries to cross later on.

If you'll notice, one of them did blow up, starting a fire in Rome.

Also, Heron had access to all the parts needed to make more advanced steam engines and it is certainly conceivalbe that, if given the reason, he could have pushed the technology further. With that said, I have not written about a working industrial steam engine, we aren't there yet.

Now for more...

75AD- On a sunny morning in mid March, Polonius revealed his completed steam driven paddle boat to a few dozen curious onlookers. Ships of all types were a very common sight to the people of Alexandria, one of the largest ports of the Empire, but none with two large pin wheels of ores faceted to either side. Palonius’ vessel, named The Heron, in honor of the master scholar, also featured a strange lump in the center with a long pipe jutting from the top to vent smoke.

With a growing number of eyes scrutinizing their work, Palonius and Braxis began stoking the fires that would heat the boiler, forcing thick plumes of gray/black smoke to begin billowing from the short stack. Given the shortage of wood in the Egyptian area, Braxis had suggested a combination of wood and oil to make fuel more economical, the resulting smoke bearing an unusual color and aroma.

After nearly an hour, during which time more onlookers had gathered, more interested in the crowd than the device, Palonius decided enough steam had been generated to engage the paddles. With a startling roar followed by groaning metal and wood, the paddles stuttered into operation. Water, churned white by the paddles, flung up and over the wheels, spraying the sizable crowed who cheered with glee.

Despite the adjustments made by the Boatwright, the paddles created a great deal of foam and spray, reducing the amount of effective propulsion they generated. This gave the ship a rather unimpressive acceleration; especially considering the load the engine was being forced to endure. However, the ship did move forward without any assistance from wind nor hand drawn ores. It was a success.

The Heron’s maiden voyage took it to the mouth of the harbor where it garnished additional attention from traditionally powered vessels on their way in or out of port. It was at this point that Palonius was to discover flaws in his design not initially anticipated. Roman vessels lacked a keel, the long spine of a ship that runs from aft to stern and jutting into the water. A keel not only strengthens a ship structurally but acts as a fixed rudder, keeping the vessel upright and stable. Without this basic nautical device, Roman vessels were more difficult to control and more likely to capsize in the right conditions. Unknowingly, Palnoius had created those conditions perfectly with his vessel.

To begin with, the large metal boiler was perched above deck, making the vessel top heavy. This was compensated, theoretically, by the fuel being kept below deck but The Heron only carried enough for a short trip around the harbor and neither Braxis nor Palonius had thought to compensate with additional ballast. To make the problem worse, the boiler had been surrounded by a thick layer of clay to prevent the heat from igniting the wood around it, increasing the weight above deck.

Secondly, the engine required a great deal of water to operate. This was stored onboard in a large tank below deck. When a container of water is tilted back and forth it begins to slosh, throwing its weight first to one side and then the other. Eventually, if not compensated for, this can cause the container to flip over. While the water tank on The Heron was firmly securing and the waters of the harbor calm, the agitating effect caused by the inefficient ores began the sloshing and, unable to flip over within the vessel, forced the entire ship to rock back and forth.

By the time the men aboard realized there was a problem it was too late, the wake from a passing ship tipped The Heron first on her side and then, quickly, all the way over. As soon as the cool Mediterranean water came in contact with the hot boiler it promptly exploded, tearing the boat around it in two. What remained quickly sank to the bottom of the harbor amidst a thunderous cloud of steam.

Palonius and Braxis had ordered the vessel abandoned when the rocking became uncontrollable and as such, there was only one death, that of a deck hand who did not know how to swim. Their ship, and the revolutionary enhancements made to it, however, was completely unsalvageable.

[Ofaloaf]

Originally Posted by DonMegel

If you'll notice, one of them did blow up, starting a fire in Rome.

Also, Heron had access to all the parts needed to make more advanced steam engines and it is certainly conceivalbe that, if given the reason, he could have pushed the technology further. With that said, I have not written about a working industrial steam engine, we aren't there yet.

Hero of Alexandria made a tea kettle that could spin around on an axle, and that's pretty much all the aeolipile was. Now, within 20 years of Hero's tea kettle, in this timeline there's a guy who's managed to make a working steamer-- one that, while it did capsize, managed to nonetheless produce enough force to move the ship forward.

Here, Palonius has managed to build all that without being able to measure the temperature of the firebox, without being able to measure the pressure of steam in the boiler, without knowing the strength of the metals he's working with, without even having algebra to work with. If asked, he could not reproduce a quarter of the data in, say, Oliver Evan's guide to steam engineering, because he still has no way of measuring anything of his own engines.

I'm still not sure if Palonius' engines are more like Newcomen's or Watt's engines, but even so it took 60 years of development after Papin's pressure cooker for someone to make a Newcomen-engine powered steamer that worked decently (Papin's own model managed to move a few kilometers down the calm Fulda river thirty years after he made the pressure-cooker, but nothing came of it) and just about a century after Papin's pressure cooker for someone to make a workable steamer based off James Watt's engine-- and that was with them all being able to actually measure and calculate things!

[DonMegel]

Originally Posted by Ofaloaf

Hero of Alexandria made a tea kettle that could spin around on an axle, and that's pretty much all the aeolipile was. Now, within 20 years of Hero's tea kettle, in this timeline there's a guy who's managed to make a working steamer-- one that, while it did capsize, managed to nonetheless produce enough force to move the ship forward.

Here, Palonius has managed to build all that without being able to measure the temperature of the firebox, without being able to measure the pressure of steam in the boiler, without knowing the strength of the metals he's working with, without even having algebra to work with. If asked, he could not reproduce a quarter of the data in, say, Oliver Evan's guide to steam engineering, because he still has no way of measuring anything of his own engines.

I'm still not sure if Palonius' engines are more like Newcomen's or Watt's engines, but even so it took 60 years of development after Papin's pressure cooker for someone to make a Newcomen-engine powered steamer that worked decently (Papin's own model managed to move a few kilometers down the calm Fulda river thirty years after he made the pressure-cooker, but nothing came of it) and just about a century after Papin's pressure cooker for someone to make a workable steamer based off James Watt's engine-- and that was with them all being able to actually measure and calculate things!

I will concede that I am putting a great deal of faith in the collected knowledge in the Library of Alexandria. When the Library was sacked, the scrolls inside were distributed to the hundreds of bathhouses in Alexandria to be used as fuel. It took six months before they were all used up. The Library represents an incredible store of knowledge as well as a gathering place for the most capable minds from all over the known world.

Among those present would certainly be metallurgists who, while not able to give a number value to the strength of metallic compounds, would certainly be able to tell if a metal was strong or weak and how well it would perform under heat. Heron and his students would have toyed with pressures and no doubt recorded the results of their trials and errors. This will become an issue when more engines are produced and others asked to use them. There are also questions of durability, how long the engine can operate under load.

I also assume, for my TL, that Heron combined the force pump, basically a piston system, with his steam boilers to create a more efficient system. I am not suggesting the Aeophile was tied to paddle wheels, rather that he had something better.

Obviously these events are not likely, but they are possible. That’s what I am exploring, what could have happened.

[Elfwine]

Originally Posted by DonMegel

Sophocles play, Odeipus Rex, which is widely regarded as one of the best Greek tragidies ever written, came in second place when he submitted it to a contest. The first place play has been lost to history. Just because somthing is good does not mean it will survive 2,000 years of record.

Reliability, ofcourse, is a concern, but so far in my TL has not been an issue because no one is using steam engines, just Palonius. Presumably, if it breaks wile he is using it, he can fix it.

There's a huge difference between "good" when it comes to drama, and "good" when it comes to mechanical engineering. One is subjective. The other is not.

And it is very much an issue when it comes to Palonius convincing anyone that its worth the trouble of paying him for this.

Plus what Ofaloaf said.

The tools to provide the data don't exist, so how does it matter how many scrolls are in the LoA?

You need much more sophisticated and precise information than "this metal is strong" or how the metal performs in entirely different circumstances.

And "I assume that Hero(n) did this" with no evidence behind it is the stuff fantasy is made of, not alternate history.

[Herzen's love-child]

I'd cut a little slack for this TL. There is evidence that the Ancients knew something about the expansion & contraction of liquids in the presence of heat and cold (including by Heron) so is it conceivable that a rudimentary device for measuring temperature couldn't have been fashioned in this era? I would agree that development of the steam engine is developing preternaturally fast & would give it a couple of generations of development as opposed to one man following in the footsteps of Heron. Kind of shades of a super genius Soviet engineer in a certain post 1900 timeline...

[DonMegel]

Originally Posted by Elfwine

There's a huge difference between "good" when it comes to drama, and "good" when it comes to mechanical engineering. One is subjective. The other is not.

And it is very much an issue when it comes to Palonius convincing anyone that its worth the trouble of paying him for this.

Plus what Ofaloaf said.

The tools to provide the data don't exist, so how does it matter how many scrolls are in the LoA?

You need much more sophisticated and precise information than "this metal is strong" or how the metal performs in entirely different circumstances.

And "I assume that Hero(n) did this" with no evidence behind it is the stuff fantasy is made of, not alternate history.

Greek fire was very useful and successful to the Eastern Empire (Byzantine) but its formula has been lost. If Heron’s design existed only as a small prototype or on paper it very easily could have been lost

Palonius has been funding these projects with his own money. I am not suggesting anyone would pay for this as is for a commercial application but he is thinking the wealthier members of Rome would pay to have something like this for its prestige value.

My point about the scrolls was that there was a vast amount of information there. I doubt a blue print of a modern steam engine was among them, but helpful information none-the-less.

Assuming something happened or did not happened is the basis of alternate history discussions. If one does not assume something changed then we would only be discussing how things actually happened rather than how they could have happened. It would be different if I was assuming an alien delivered a nuke to the Roman Emperor Nero and how that would effect the TL. My assumption is based on Heron’s work and the situation I have placed him in.

[Elfwine]

Originally Posted by Herzen's love-child

I'd cut a little slack for this TL. There is evidence that the Ancients knew something about the expansion & contraction of liquids in the presence of heat and cold (including by Heron) so is it conceivable that a rudimentary device for measuring temperature couldn't have been fashioned in this era? I would agree that development of the steam engine is developing preternaturally fast & would give it a couple of generations of development as opposed to one man following in the footsteps of Heron. Kind of shades of a super genius Soviet engineer in a certain post 1900 timeline...

A rudimentary device, yes, something precise enough to serve as a practical instrument that would supply exact data down to the very fine levels necessary to do this right? No.

Originally Posted by DonMegel

Greek fire was very useful and successful to the Eastern Empire (Byzantine) but its formula has been lost. If Heron’s design existed only as a small prototype or on paper it very easily could have been lost

Its formula was also a state secret. Again, not the same thing.

Palonius has been funding these projects with his own money. I am not suggesting anyone would pay for this as is for a commercial application but he is thinking the wealthier members of Rome would pay to have something like this for its prestige value.

Which still means it has to work reliably. If its constantly in need of repair, it just looks silly.

My point about the scrolls was that there was a vast amount of information there. I doubt a blue print of a modern steam engine was among them, but helpful information none-the-less.

Helpful information for this? I very much doubt it. There's no reason for there to be such information there and only there.

Assuming something happened or did not happened is the basis of alternate history discussions. If one does not assume something changed then we would only be discussing how things actually happened rather than how they could have happened. It would be different if I was assuming an alien delivered a nuke to the Roman Emperor Nero and how that would effect the TL. My assumption is based on Heron’s work and the situation I have placed him in.

Your assumption is based on taking a toy and ignoring that it took decades of research, development, and failed experiments by people with centuries more knowledge and technological development so that you can have early steam engines without the issues that they raise.

"What if Hero(n) had this in his notes?" is a what if. Insisting that he did and we just lost those notes is either fantasy or conspiracy.

Is it possible that an earlier steam engine could be developed? Sure. It would be at least as hard as it was in the 18th and early 19th century, if not harder, to do in this period.

[Herzen's love-child]

I guess Elfwine, the question is how precise a device is necessary for a 1st generation steam engine. For determining pressure as well as temp.---I think the 2 main areas that need to be measured. I don't know enough about steam engineering technology in the OTL to say for a fact what degree of finesse measuring devices had at the 1st generation stage. I do remember making a rudimentary thermometer at a science camp when I was like 10 which was amazingly accurate compared to a mercury thermometer. It used very basic materials.

[Elfwine]

Originally Posted by Herzen's love-child

I guess Elfwine, the question is how precise a device is necessary for a 1st generation steam engine. For determining pressure as well as temp.---I think the 2 main areas that need to be measured. I don't know enough about steam engineering technology in the OTL to say for a fact what degree of finesse measuring devices had at the 1st generation stage. I do remember making a rudimentary thermometer at a science camp when I was like 10 which was amazingly accurate compared to a mercury thermometer. It used very basic materials.

I don't know how precise they were, but they didn't take as long as they did for nothing.

This is going to take a lot of experimentation and failure - you had the benefit of the fact that the studies had been done so that you didn't have to invent the wheel.

[carlton_bach]

Originally Posted by Herzen's love-child

I guess Elfwine, the question is how precise a device is necessary for a 1st generation steam engine. For determining pressure as well as temp.---I think the 2 main areas that need to be measured. I don't know enough about steam engineering technology in the OTL to say for a fact what degree of finesse measuring devices had at the 1st generation stage. I do remember making a rudimentary thermometer at a science camp when I was like 10 which was amazingly accurate compared to a mercury thermometer. It used very basic materials.

Actually I don't think you need to measure temperature. Pressure is what really matter, because it will destroy your machine a long time before you reach the critical steam flash threshold. Once you know what you are doing - even roughly - you can built a rudimentary safety valve.

The problem is, though, that it's still all happening too fast. The ancients were amazingly good with thechnology, but it was still the technology of their day. They had developed techniques for gauging tension and pressure and had machines that relied on pressurised air and water, but the scaling and development were all done hands-on. Roman artillerymen were taught to equalise the pressure on their catapults by striking the torsion strings. You could gauge it by the sound (which is why having an artilleryman's ear meant something different back then). You'll need to build up a great store of practical knowledge before you can take the respective next step, even if you have someone as willing to fund you as Dionysios.

[DonMegel]

So what if it was a state secret? It was still knowledge of a technology that has been lost. How much easier would it have been to lose a design for an engine when there was no perceived use for the engine in the time it was designed?

Heron’s notes: Heron studied, among many other things, pressures of water and steam. Heron was known to test his theories and conduct experiments. It is not unreasonable to think he would record the results of these experiments.

Scrolls: Archimedes was a major source of information and inspiration for Heron. His work, no doubt, was documented in the Library. Not counting for lost works, these alone would be useful to Palonius.

Prestige: How often to wealthy people buy things that are not practical or require frequent maintenance? The point is that other people see the device when it is functioning and thus are impressed. What does it matter to a rich person if servants have to constantly adjust/clean/maintain something so long as it works when they want it to?

[Elfwine]

Originally Posted by DonMegel

So what if it was a state secret? It was still knowledge of a technology that has been lost. How much easier would it have been to lose a design for an engine when there was no perceived use for the engine in the time it was designed?

So, it would be very easy for it to be lost or forgotten, because the Byzantines are deliberately trying to avoid the knowledge being available. This, on the other hand, no. If its a viable design for something practical or profitable, people will not stuff it away in the LoA archives and forget about it, they'll talk about it, tinker with it, take notes of their own - etc..

Heron’s notes: Heron studied, among many other things, pressures of water and steam. Heron was known to test his theories and conduct experiments. It is not unreasonable to think he would record the results of these experiments.

It is very unreasonable to think that this would be enough to build on to the extent your timeline does. His aeropile is about as far from a steam engine of the sort we usually think of as spam is from food.

Scrolls: Archimedes was a major source of information and inspiration for Heron. His work, no doubt, was documented in the Library. Not counting for lost works, these alone would be useful to Palonius.

Prestige: How often to wealthy people buy things that are not practical or require frequent maintenance? The point is that other people see the device when it is functioning and thus are impressed. What does it matter to a rich person if servants have to constantly adjust/clean/maintain something so long as it works when they want it to?

And how does Archimedes translate into useful knowledge here again?

The whole problem with 'unreliable" is that it doesn't always work when you want it to. There's nothing prestigious about a toy that breaks down in front of your guests.

So it very much matters to a rich person whether or not they can rely on it working most of the time.

[Herzen's love-child]

But how high a bar must there be for this TL to be in this forum as opposed to ASB? To me, with a few tweaks, the premise is vaguely conceivable to be possible---my main problem, again, is speed of development. Stretch it out half a century or more, assume constant patronage and several personages involved in the testing, observation, prototyping, development and I can live with this TL.
I mean, if a Byzantine Empire can survive the 4th Crusade or Vikings found permanent settlement in the New World (in this forum), why not a Roman steam-engine?

[Ofaloaf]

Originally Posted by Herzen's love-child

But how high a bar must there be for this TL to be in this forum as opposed to ASB? To me, with a few tweaks, the premise is vaguely conceivable to be possible---my main problem, again, is speed of development. Stretch it out half a century or more, assume constant patronage and several personages involved in the testing, observation, prototyping, development and I can live with this TL.
I mean, if a Byzantine Empire can survive the 4th Crusade or Vikings found permanent settlement in the New World (in this forum), why not a Roman steam-engine?

I'm pretty much in agreement with you there, but with the additional caveat that there's very little groundwork established in this period for the precision needed even for 18th-century 1st-generation engines. There's no temperature guage for Palonius and others to work with[1], no measurable pressure guage to work with[2], and generally very few of the tools needed to build these things at a large scale with some sense of reliability. Jumping straight to development of the steam engine skips over the century-and-a-half of the Scientific Revolution which preceded it and laid the foundations for its development.

Even if the Hellenes of Alexandria developed more advanced boiler systems than the aeolipile, left the designs for the printing press hidden in a manuscript in the Library of Alexandria and built rudimentary computers in their spare time, they still don't have the systems of measurement, the tools to measure, the methods of calucation later introduced in the Mathematica and algebra, or much of the Scientific Method in general needed to get this stuff done properly. I can accept these things can be developed during the period, but, much like the purported manuscripts lost in the Library of Alexandria, there's not much evidence of them being in this TL yet.

Steam engines need calculations and measurements to be built properly and be remotely safe when in operation. It hurts like hell even when you have one of those model alcohol-burning engines blow up on you-- I can testify to that.


[1] I don't buy the idea of a thermometer being something created and saved only in the Library of Alexandria or any such thing; thermometers are quite useful and have a wide variety of applications, so if one was invented it'd be everywhere and we'd at least have some reference to it other works of the period.

[2] A liquid column gauge is better than nothing, at least, but there's no evidence even for that during the late Hellenistic or Roman periods.

[Elfwine]

What Ofaloaf said.

It would be very interesting to see someone see the aeropile/aeolipile and tinker with ideas of their own, leading of the course of much time and development to early invention of a reliable and useful steam engine (even as a toy, it needs to be able to do something) - but Super Genius invention is not so interesting and definitely not anywhere near as plausible.

Even half a century would be astonishingly quick, depending on what the end result is.

[Herzen's love-child]

Since OTL development of a practical steam engine was in fits and starts by different people at different times and not so much by state patronage as by private (or out of pocket) sources, I was giving the benefit of the doubt that a source of consistent (and bottomless) funding might accelerate things a bit. That, and some sort of continuing "school" of Heron that would last multiple generations would be necessary prerequisites. By 50 years, I'm not talking of development to the steamboat stage, either. Something much less grandiose.

[Elfwine]

Originally Posted by Herzen's love-child

Since OTL development of a practical steam engine was in fits and starts by different people at different times and not so much by state patronage as by private (or out of pocket) sources, I was giving the benefit of the doubt that a source of consistent (and bottomless) funding might accelerate things a bit. That, and some sort of continuing "school" of Heron that would last multiple generations would be necessary prerequisites. By 50 years, I'm not talking of development to the steamboat stage, either. Something much less grandiose.

Consistent and bottomless funding?

That didn't even happen with things royalty wanted - see this guy's story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_...h_B%C3%B6ttger (wiki doesn't go into great detail, but I've read Gleeson's book).


Why would a Roman emperor agree to that for something that has no sign of worth it? Not whether or not a useful steam engine if you could present one would be, just that the early stuff is far from anything that could be put to use as anything other than a novelty (and there are less expensive ways to get those).

And it really doesn't make up for having to build the tools to build the tools - heck, that you need certain things to be done is going to be learned the hard way as people try and fail with different things.

[Herzen's love-child]

Well, Elfwine, it isn't my TL after all...so I don't want to invest much more energy into this. Of course, I'm familiar with stories like that & of course Royals were duped on a regular basis and worthy inventions thwarted by fickle investors and everything in-between. I was suggesting an ultimately unlikely but ever so slightly "best of all possible worlds" basis for making the 1st Century industrial revolution possible in this TL.