0

When Trains Ran on Air

via Engadget

Isambard Kingdom Brunel was and is one of the most celebrated engineers ever to have lived. There’s a London university named after him, statues commemorating him across the UK, and many of the tunnels and bridges he built are still in use today. He designed London’s Paddington station, built the first transatlantic steamship powered by propellers, and was chief engineer of the Great Western Railway, which connected the capital to distant parts of England and Wales.

His legacy isn’t just one of achievements, though. He is also renowned for his involvement in one failed project in particular: Brunel’s atmospheric railway (or “caper,” as it’s sometimes called). Cars on the line — officially, the South Devon Railway — had no on-board engines, as they were driven by air pressure alone. But the design of the system was ultimately flawed. Within a year of service starting, atmospheric propulsion on the South Devon Railway was quickly abandoned.

Brunel’s atmospheric railway is notable because of its length and the name attached to it. The famed engineer had nothing to do with the concept itself, however. The story begins as early as the late 1600s with French scholar Denis Papin, who worked on the beginnings of leverging air pressure and steam power.

At the turn of the 19th century, London-based inventor George Medhurst floated the first well-rounded idea of using compressed air as a fuel of sorts, patenting what he called the “Aeolian engine.” Over the next 30 years, he published several manuscriptsoutlining in detail how air pressure could push anything from letters to heavy goods and people through closed systems. He thought passenger trains could either travel inside a large duct, or be pulled by a piston that air could force along a much smaller tube.

See more!


Halloween season is here!
Halloween season is here! Check out all the posts, gift guides, and more!

Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat and our Discord!

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 38,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — JP’s Product Pick of the Week — 4pm Eastern TODAY! 11/5/24 @adafruit #adafruit #newproductpick

Python for Microcontrollers – Adafruit Daily — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: MicroPython v1.24.0 is here, a Halloween Wrap-up and Much More! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

EYE on NPI – Adafruit Daily — EYE on NPI Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Halloween, WiLo, and more!

Maker Business – Adafruit Daily — First Solar’s $1.1 billion development of vertically integrated factory in the U.S.

Electronics – Adafruit Daily — Trigger happy oscilloscope?

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.