Hello everyone! Do you know how the steam engine works? Well, that's what we're
talking about today! Have you ever seen
your mom or dad boil some water in a tea
kettle? When the water gets hot it makes
steam. The steam expands inside the
kettle and then ... that's right! It pushes
out of the kettle. Old locomotives were
powered in much the same way. Let's look inside a steam engine and see what's
going on. The fireman shovels coal inside the
firebox. Coal is a fossil fuel that's
taken from deep inside the earth. The
heat from the fire, passes through many
different pipes, that run through a tank
of water called a firetube boiler. This
gets the water boiling hot and makes... you
guessed it! Steam! The steam creates a lot of pressure. A valve that the engineer
controls, releases steam to the front of
the train. The steam is directed into the
cylinder through a valve. A piston pushes
the drive rod back, moving the attached
wheel. Other wheels are connected to this
wheel with coupling rods. As the piston
returns to where it started, the old
steam escapes. All this happens very
quickly once the train is chugging along.
Well there you have it friends! Do you
have a question for our next episode? Be
sure to leave it in the comments and
we'll answer it when we can. Thanks for
dropping by! Class is dismissed!
