Anna walked around the prototype twice, accurately expressing her first impression.
“It’s… small.”
“But it has an indescribable beauty,” Serin mused, “especially the dense pipes around it, almost like tentacles.”
Roland couldn't help but laugh. Their perspectives were completely different, but the conclusions they reached were remarkably accurate, succinctly expressing the characteristics of the new machine.
Compared to the first cast iron steam engine Anna made, the prototype's volume was reduced by more than ten times. This was partly due to a significant leap in processing technology, but mainly due to the elimination of the boiler.
Currently, Neverwinter's steam engine has evolved to the fourth generation, but the boiler part has not changed much—whether it burns coke, firewood, or heavy oil, a huge combustion chamber and steam generator are unavoidable. Now, it is replaced by a rectangular steel box only one meter long, half a meter wide, and less than twenty centimeters thick.
This box is also the core of the entire system.
Although, simply put, it is to put the magic cube and water into a container to achieve the fusion of combustion and evaporation, neither the almost demanding sealing requirements nor the high-pressure-resistant pipeline shell could be achieved by Border Town at the beginning. In other words, even if they could obtain the relics of the Radioactive Clan at that time, the effect it could play would be no different from others.
Three Ritual Magic Cubes are embedded side by side at one end of the steel box as the source of the machine's power, and a layer of lead blocks is padded at the bottom to block excess radiation. More than a dozen heat pipes are neatly arranged on the top of the smooth shell, passing through the secondary water tank and the cooling condenser before returning from the bottom. Its "heating-energy supply-cooling" cycle is completely closed and does not exchange with the outside world. If the equipment is reliable enough, theoretically, there is no need to add new heat transfer medium until it is scrapped.
Of course, this size is not the limit of the new steam engine.
Water is only the most readily available and cheapest heat transfer medium. If other more efficient media, such as liquid alkali metals, are used, the volume under the same power can be even smaller.
However, the prototype mainly verifies the feasibility of the plan, and Roland finally resisted the urge to do it in one step. After all, in case of an overheating and leakage accident, if the alkali metal in the steam state is mixed with water vapor, the entire laboratory would probably be blown to the sky.
The pipes extending from the heating box can continuously transfer the heat generated by the magic cube until the secondary water tank boils. The subsequent process is no different from ordinary steam engines, using Neverwinter's already mature technology.
And what Serin appreciates most is the condensing pipe evenly distributed on both sides of the machine body—in order to obtain a sufficiently large heat dissipation area, each pipe twists and turns, saying that it is a tentacle is not an exaggeration.
If the current steam engines are all big, stupid and rough, this prototype can be completely called compact and exquisite. Especially the silver-white core box and the brownish-red heat transfer copper pipes that can reflect human faces complement each other. In terms of color and brightness, it is much more dazzling than its predecessors. Even a layman who knows nothing about industry can tell the level at a glance.
Just from the process, it is enough to be worthy of the title of artwork.
“Then… let’s start?” Roland looked at the two.
Anna nodded and stretched out her hand to place it on the operating lever, “Let’s do it together.”
Serin hesitated, and finally lowered her main whisker, gently placed it on the hands of the King and Queen.
“Magic Cube Steam Engine Prototype Experiment, three, two, one, start—”
Accompanied by Roland’s countdown, the operating lever was pulled to the maximum limit with a click, and the linkage mechanism simultaneously pressed down the switches of the three magic cubes. The new generation of power sources with milestone significance began its first operation.
However, the scene was silent, and nothing seemed to have happened.
“Uh… did it fail?” Serin said hesitantly, looking at the machine that did not respond.
“No, let it burn for a while,” Roland replied calmly.
After about two minutes, the core box vibrated slightly, and a "indicator light" on the pipeline emitted a soft yellow
light—it was a pressure gauge made of Fireman relics, which indicated that the pressure in the tube was changing.
And the heat transfer process was obviously much slower. After waiting for nearly five minutes, the secondary water tank finally gushed out steam and pushed the piston to run slowly.
As the temperature in the tube gradually increased, the speed of the steam engine flywheel also increased, and it also drove the water pump of the condensing system—the main function of the latter is to increase the speed of fluid circulation in the tube and draw the heat transfer medium with reduced temperature back to the core box. At this point, the new machine completed a complete cycle and officially entered the operating state.
“It seems to work well,” Anna breathed a sigh of relief, with a faint smile on her face, “It’s just that the starting speed is a bit slow.”
“This is also a common problem of steam engines,” Roland nodded. Heat transfer takes time. Even if you switch to a more efficient heat medium, it is not an internal combustion engine that can move when it is ignited. In addition, since at least three water tanks are theoretically required to maintain circulation, its volume will still be much larger than internal combustion engines. In addition, the Ritual Magic Cube consumes uranium flakes too quickly, resulting in this prototype having almost no practical value.
But any industrial product has come this way step by step.
As long as Serin can solve the durability problem, its distinct advantages cannot be ignored—the mature technology allows it to be quickly put into production, and the light volume is enough to be placed in most means of transportation, and the popularization will not increase the fuel load, etc. Even if the durability problem cannot be improved for a while, ships built on the basis of the new power source can save a lot of space for storing fuel, so as to load more goods or weapons.
Half an hour later, the speed of the steam engine reached its limit, the entire machine was shaking, and the hissing sound of the exhaust port turned into a sharp whistle. Obviously, the core box composed of three magic cubes had too much power for this steam engine. Roland pulled the operating lever back to the first gear, which was equivalent to turning off two magic cubes, so that the prototype stabilized again.
After that, it was a long reliability test.
This step will last about a week, and it is also the easiest part to expose problems. After all, the principle of the new machine is simple to say, and it is not difficult to make it move. The difficulty is to run it for a long time and stably.
Originally, guarding a steam engine that was clanging non-stop was an extremely boring thing, but for Roland, it became a means of decompression. Accompanying Anna sitting in the yard, chatting while paying attention to the dynamics of the prototype, it was like the time when the two first met, relaxed and peaceful.
I don’t know when, Serin quietly left the laboratory, leaving only him and Anna in the yard.
The latter leaned her head on his shoulder, and the noise of the machine seemed to become very distant.
“If it succeeds, we will be one step closer to your world, right?”
“Yes, it will be shortened a lot—you know, that world has not yet realized similar technologies.”
“Can that kind of four-wheeled car that one person can drive be realized?”
“Yes, if you like, I can design a simple one for you to try first.”
“Okay!” Anna’s voice was much more cheerful, “By the way, what name are you going to give this machine?”
“Does it have to have a name?” Roland smiled.
“Of course.” Her expression was unusually serious.
“Okay then, Black Technology No. 1 or Magic Cube Power, which one do you choose?”
“Where is it black… really, I choose the latter. But how do you distinguish the different models with this name?”
“Simple, one Ritual Magic Cube represents one cylinder, and the prototype is called a Three-Cylinder Magic Cube Power, how about that?”
“It always feels a bit weird somewhere.”
“Don’t worry about those details…”
The laughter of the two and the roar of the machine mixed together, forming a melody that lingered in the yard for a long time.