Peter Brow (b. 1961) is a southern California landlord, inventor, writer, artist, and futurist. This website has been created to introduce his unusual and sometimes visionary work to the public.

11-4-2005: This is the hottest news in the steam car world in decades! Modelworks International, a major English steam engine manufacturer with a great track record, is now commercially producing brand-new, street-legal replicas of the 1901 Locomobile steam automobile! The first kits have now been delivered to customers and are being assembled! Full information on the Modelworks Locomobile project, plus illustrations, diagrams, and other information on the classic, great-running Locomobile steam cars, and a link to one builder's current webpage. Plus, how YOU can get one! Would you like to own a new steam car? Check it out!

Currently I am working on a project to design and build the steam automobile of the future. The design has evolved over 20 years of research and experimentation, and is now nearing the prototype construction stage. I plan to install the prototype powerplant in a spare 1969 VW Beetle which I have in my shop. Later powerplants will be installed in more up-to-date cars, including sports cars, and I am investigating limited production and marketing them as components, kits, or installed in turn-key customized cars. Many of the components will have other uses, like driving electrical generators, boats, etc., even experimental light airplanes!

The futuristic steam car which I am designing will have many advantages over today's cars. The powerplant will fit neatly under the hood of any car. It will run absolutely silent and smooth, with no puttering exhaust or grinding starter motor, no engine idling at stops, no squealing belts, clattering valves, or humming gears, no engine vibration, and no automatic transmission gearshift "clunks". You won't even know the engine is running, except for the fact that you are pressing on the accelerator pedal and the car is moving. It will be as smooth and silent as coasting downhill in a conventional car with the engine turned off and the transmission in neutral. Open the window and listen to the birds singing in the trees as you glide silently by.

Impossible? No! Stanley steam cars ran this smoothly and quietly 85 years ago! Hundreds of 'em are still around and still run this well.

My steam car will start up faster than a conventional car, because a tiny safety-sealed pilot light (using a few pints of fuel a week) will maintain full steam pressure in the boiler at all times. There is no waiting for warmup. You get in, turn the key, and go, with no starter, gearshift, clutch, boiler warmup, or special controls to mess with. Everything is completely automatic.

My steam car will be easier to drive than a conventional car, with no gears to shift or clutch to pedal. Just operate the steering wheel and accelerator and brake pedals. Like an automatic transmission conventional car, but even easier overall. A little lever on the steering column reverses the engine for backing up. Best of all, the engine will have enough power to slip the tires on dry pavement if desired, and will provide the maximum possible acceleration on command. Or, you can drive as slowly and easily as you like. The prototype will be able to cruise at 80 mph continuously (that's 10-15 mph faster than the original gas engine in this car), and much higher speeds will be possible in later versions.

Fuel mileage will be about 25 mpg (same as original gas engine) in the VW Bug prototype, and better in the more aerodynamic modern vehicles to follow. Properly-designed steam cars get about the same fuel mileage or better than equivalent conventional cars. As built, my car will run on any grade of gasoline, gasohol, or kerosine, any mix of these, or even a 50/50 diesel/gasoline mix, and can be converted to run on any kind of combustible fuel, even solid fuels! Exhaust emissions will be cleaner than the best of today's cars, and city fuel mileage will be better than an identical car with a conventional gas engine powerplant.

Maintenance will consist of a few cheap, easy operations at 6000 mile intervals, which is less frequent than recommended oil & filter changes in today's cars. The powerplant will be entirely owner-serviceable with simple tools and low-cost parts if desired, and in commercial production would come with a complete owner's service manual. For other owners, a complete 100,000 mile service policy, covering all parts and labor, would be available at low cost.

I anticipate a powerplant life of at least 100,000 miles in the prototype (once development work is complete), and up to 500,000 mile life is possible for mature production models. There are a number of 1920s Doble steam cars with over 500,000 miles on their original engines and boilers, showing that long service life is quite achievable with steam cars. With modern materials, achieving this long powerplant life should be even easier.

In production, the retail cost of this steam car powerplant would be about $3000, the same as a conventional internal combustion (IC) car powerplant.

If you leave the car standing for more than two weeks, the pilot light will turn off automatically to avoid draining the tank. When you start up again with the pilot off, everything starts automatically at the turn of the key, and it takes about 2 minutes to build up full steam pressure. This wait will be rare, as almost all cars are driven at least a few times a week, if not daily. There is also a manual pilot shutoff on the dashboard, used when putting the car in storage. In regular service the pilot light maintains full pressure and prevents freezing in cold weather, but the whole system is designed to freeze without damage, and the car defrosts and fires up automatically when the key is turned on. Unlike today's gas cars, there is no need for special antifreeze chemicals or an electric "block heater" to prevent damage or to get started in freezing weather.

An earlier steam car design, which I worked on from about 1997-1999, involved converting a spare aircooled VW Beetle engine into a steam engine. After further study, I decided that the heat and friction losses in that powerplant would have been too great, among other problems, so I developed this design. A description of the earlier design was lost when my former website hosts went out of business, taking my files into oblivion with them.

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