Steam engines today

Manual Controls. The first methods used in energy control involved human intei vention. The operator was the sensor (i.e., using his eyes, ears, and hands or using additional devices to quantify the values of the controlled variables), and he was also the actuator controller. The control of the processes was slow and vei y ineffective. For example, in an old steam engine control the human operator sees the instantaneous pressure and then manually regulates the power of the device (e.g., by adding fuel to a boiler). But in today s industrial reality, this control is not only ineffective but in most cases is not possible. 

C06-0027. In the nineteenth century, coal-fiieled steam engines were widespread. Today, petroleum-fueled internal combustion engines have replaced them. Suggest reasons for this replacement. 

Today, boats and trains powered by steam are not widely used. Most transportation steam engines have been replaced by internal combustion engines, which burn fuel inside the engine... 

Notwithstanding the work of all kinds done by steam-engines, notwithstanding the satisfactory condition to which they have been brought today, their theory is very little understood, and the attempts to improve them are still directed almost by chance. 

Coal has been used for centuries. Roman historians describe coal as a heating source, and coal was probably used in China 2000 years ago. Early coal mining was small scale and based on coal lying either on or very close to the surface. With the Industrial Revolution and the use of steam engines, coal became the preferred fuel and deep shaft mining became popular. Today, coal production has reached 3.3 billion tonnes oil equivalent (Table 5.1.30). 

In Sir Isaac Newton s time (1642-1726) and during the following century, science consisted mostly of the study of motion as governed by Newtons laws of motion, a field still known today as mechanics. In the 1700s, an understanding of mechanical processes spawned the industrial revolution, marked importantly by the invention of the steam engine. 

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