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MUSEUMS THAT DISPLAY AIR CARS
and related
items
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At the Empire Gold Mine State Park
in Grass Valley, California, a simple compressed air locomotive (see
above picture) resides on the grounds. It looks like an
off-the-shelf four-cylinder reversible piston air motor bolted
to a chassis along with a large iron air reservoir. A simple,
high-torque "air mule". Much earlier, compressor
entrepreneur Edward A. Rix also custom-designed pneumatic locomotives
for this famous mine and for the North Star Gold Mine on the next hill
over, where the largest Pelton water wheel ever made operated a 1000
horsepower compressor that provided air for both mines.
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There
was an H. K. Porter compressed
air locomotive at Mel Ott Park on the Belle Chase Highway in Gretna,
Louisiana. It belonged to the Louisiana Railway Heritage
Trust. It has been moved to Jefferson, Louisiana.
It is still in good
condition and may one day be restored to operating condition.
There is a photo at
http://steamlocomotive.info/vlocomotive.cfm?Display=3899.
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A Newcomen Society website
reference mentions a compressed air locomotive that is part of a
collection maintained by a group whose holdings include the Maastricht
to Aachen railway line at Simpelveld, the Netherlands. The
website doesn't give the name of the group or its museum. The
Newcomen Society is a scientific organization that has been around
forever. Their website reference is at
http://newcomen.com/eindhoven.htm.
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Frankfurter Feldbahnmuseum (Steam
train museum in Frankfurter, Germany): the collection includes over
two dozen locomotives of various types as well as one compressed air
locomotive. For more details, see the website at
feldbahn-ffm.de. See photos above and below, courtesy
Rolf-Dieter Reichert, secretary and webmaster, Frankfurter
Feldbahnmuseum.
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Air car inventor Terry Miller, who
was a retired aircraft electrician and taught at Spartan Technical
School in Tulsa, Oklahoma, coached a high school physics class in
Buffalo, Oklahoma in building an air car much like his Air Car
One. A race between the two cars was won by the high school
class, which was taught by Gwen Cook. The car was given to a
museum in Kansas.
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Check coal-mining districts of
France, Germany, Belgium, Pennsylvania and West Virginia for surviving
examples of the most efficient air engines ever sold commercially, the
compound interheated air engines invented by C. B. Hodges.
Please let me know if you turn anything up.
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A company named Marklin is selling
a Z Gauge DRG class V 120 Passenger Train model replica of a German
State Railroad Company diesel-pneumatic compressed air
locomotive. For more details go to
marklin.com/newprod/2003/z_01.html.
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Along Highway #3 in Coleman, Alberta, there is a compressed
air locomotive that has been made into "the world's largest piggy
bank."
http://www1.travelalberta.com/content/albertafacts/Facts_unusual.cfm.
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 The North Star Mining
Museum in Grass Valley, California houses a 30-foot diameter water
wheel that was used to operate a 1000 horsepower compressor.
This Pelton water wheel was the largest in the world. Mr. Pelton
lived just a few miles away in Camptonville, and the Miner's Foundry where the Pelton wheels were
manufactured is still in existence as a museum and convention center
in Nevada City, a few miles from the other museums.
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