When your neighbor runs out of gas for his generator, you’ll be keeping the lights on.

Electric power generation with steam at the individual household level is making a comeback. At the commercial power plant level, it never left. Even nuclear power plants run on steam.

What is new is the fairly recent phenomenon of household-size steam power units for standby power generation. Unfortunately, most people today have no idea how a steam engine works or the things you have to keep in mind when setting up a home steam power system.

The horizontal mill steam engine of yesteryear was the 350 Chevy of the nineteenth century: the most common engine known to man. This engine and its larger cousins had a thousand and one uses, from grinding grain, pumping water, running electrical generators, and more.

This steam engine is capable of putting out enough power to drive a 500-watt generator, depending on the pressure from your boiler. When the neighbors run out of gasoline and diesel fuel you will still have power from wood, trash, coal or whatever else is available.

The exhaust of this engine will also provide 40,000 BTUs of heat, ideal for steam heating your cabin, providing a heat source for the alcohol still described in our junkyard still book, heating hot water for cooking and other uses.

Our 2-cylinder 3 horsepower steam engine will provide 1500 watts of electrical power and over 100,000 BTUs of exhaust heat.

The 2-cylinder steam engine has an advantage over the 1-cylinder steam engine in that it is "self-starting." If the piston is at top or bottom dead center on the 1-cylinder steam engine, the engine will not rotate until the flywheel is turned by hand. The 2-cylinder steam engine never has both pistons at top or bottom dead center and will always rotate when steam is applied.

Understanding Steam