16th-Century Steamships?

A long web surf that started off with a google search for "engineer abortion" ended up with an encounter upon this article, which suggests that a Spanish steamship was developed and approved of in the mid-1500s. Granted, the author was making a biased interpretation of an interpretation of a document, but could such a thing have actually happened somewhere during that period? Could steam-powered ships have been developed and put to practical use during that period?

A copy of the 1825 summation of the original documents:
Blasco de Garay, a captain in the navy, proposed in 1543, to the Emperor and King, Charles the Fifth, a machine to propel large boats and ships, even in calm weather, without oars or sails. In spite of the impediments and the opposition which this project met with, the Emperor ordered a trial to be made of it in the port of Barcelona, which in fact took place on the 17th on the month of June, of the said year 1543. Garay would not explain the particulars of his discovery: it was evident however during the experiment that it consisted in a large copper of boiling water, and in moving wheels attached to either side of the ship.

The experiment was tried on a ship of two hundred tons, called the Trinity, which came from Colibre to discharge a cargo of corn at Barcelona, of which Peter de Scarza was captain. By order of Charles V, Don Henry de Toledo the governor, Don Pedro de Cordova the treasurer Ravago, and the vice chancellor, and intendant of Catalonia witnessed the experiment. In the reports made to the emperor and to the prince, this ingenious invention was generally approved, particularly on account of the promptness and facility with which the ship was made to go about. The treasurer Ravago, an enemy to the project, said that the vessel could be propelled two leagues in three hours that the machine was complicated and expensive and that there would be an exposure to danger in case the boiler should burst. The other commissioners affirmed that the vessel tacked with the same rapidity as a galley maneuvered in the ordinary way, and went at least a league an hour. As soon as the experiment was made Garay took the whole machine with which he had furnished the vessel, leaving only the wooden part in the arsenal at Barcelona, and keeping all the rest for himself.

In spite of Ravago's opposition, the invention was approved, and if the expedition in which Charles the Vth was then engaged had not prevented, he would no doubt have encouraged it. Nevertheless, the emperor promoted the inventor one grade, made him a present of two hundred thousand maravedis, and ordered the expense to be paid out of the treasury, and granted him besides many other favors.
 
Could this somehow lead to a Hapsburg steampunk super wank.

Cause if so, you'd get quite a number of members frothing at the mouth (in a good, if obsesive, way)
 
There is a better documented steam machine made by Jerónimo de Ayanz to remove water from a silver mine near Seville in 1609.
 
There is a better documented steam machine made by Jerónimo de Ayanz to remove water from a silver mine near Seville in 1609.
Who? Never heard of him before, and Google's spitting out Spanish links when I search for his name. Inventor of some sort, I take it?
 

Thande

Donor
Early steam engines were not uncommon in mining experiments in the 17th century (especially in Germany), but putting one in a ship is, I believe, novel.

This could be similar to that other oft-quoted 17th century false start, Cornelius Drebbel's submarine.
 
I don't think they would have been practical. Even in the early 19th century they weren't; they had to be pretty huge to carry the amount of fuel they would need (let alone actually needing space to fulfill a useful purpose). The engineering just wasn't there.

I guess you could maybe get some sort of tug made....Not a very good and practical one still though; furnaces need quality metal.
 
How so? Steam-powered ships means that navies are no longer thrall to the wind, making maneuverability much better.

It's not workable with 16th c technology. You have to be able to forge boilers that can withstand great enough steam pressures to be able to accomplish anything. A 16th c steamship wouldn't have enough engine-power to move and the fuel consumption would be catastrophic.

The most you could accomplish is hot water for the captain's bath.
 
It's not workable with 16th c technology. You have to be able to forge boilers that can withstand great enough steam pressures to be able to accomplish anything. A 16th c steamship wouldn't have enough engine-power to move and the fuel consumption would be catastrophic.

The most you could accomplish is hot water for the captain's bath.

Good point. Thomas Newcomen's 18th Century engines only had an efficency of 1%, which better than a horse is hardly suitable for ships.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/devon/discovering/famous/thomas_newcomen.shtml
 
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