Records are meant to be broken: 80.4 MPH on a steam-powered motorcycle
Breaking land-speed records tends to be a fairly difficult proposition. The multitude of venues for doing so nowadays has opened up the opportunities for record breaking, but has also attracted more racers going after records, ratcheting the speeds up higher every year. So it’d probably make sense to find a fairly old, fairly obscure record to break. Something like the land-speed record for steam-powered motorcycles, which was last set 118 years ago.
Or thereabouts. According to Stanley historian Jim Merrick, steam-vehicle pioneer Sylvester Roper had been timed at record-setting speeds atop his Columbia bicycle fitted with a steam engine at least twice in 1896—once at 27.07 MPH and then later during the last lap of a race at Charles River Park in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at 32.4 MPH—and he claimed to have once hit 40 MPH with his motorcycle on a straightaway south of Boston. Roper died that year while atop his motorcycle during a race, apparently from a heart attack.
One other steam-powered motorcycle appears to have gone faster than Roper’s in the intervening years: An unidentified rider atop a Stearns tandem motorcycle being used to pace a bicycle race in Chicago in November 1899 recorded a speed of 45.56 MPH. Or, at least, the bicycle racer immediately behind the motorcycle recorded that speed; everybody in attendance seemed to care more about the bicyclist’s speed than the motorcycle’s.
Enter steam enthusiast Bill Barnes of Lewistown, Pennsylvania. Barnes is no stranger to going fast in a steam-powered vehicle, given that he owns and regularly drives a Vanderbilt Cup Stanley racer replica, and he has made a business of building new burners and boilers for Stanleys. While other racers have been going after the four-wheeled steam land-speed record in recent years, setting and chasing after a new record of 148.308 MPH, Barnes decided to break Roper’s two-wheeled steam record, the longest-standing land-speed record on the books.
“I had Roper’s motorcycle here in the shop a while back, and I thought, ‘I gotta break that damn record,’ and once I talked myself into it, I had to do it,” Barnes said. That was about two years ago, but Barnes said the decision also came after about 30 years of building new and improved burners and boilers, far more efficient, lighter, and stronger than those the Stanley brothers could build more than 100 years ago. “I use a little closer tolerances on the tubes, and my burner weighs about 20 pounds, where the Stanley’s burner weighed 150 pounds.”
So Barnes went to work, basing his motorcycle around his own boiler/burner combination and a circa-1908 Stanley EX two-cylinder engine, originally good for about 10 horsepower. With his modifications to the engine and steam system, Barnes figures it’s now good for six times that number. To save weight and complexity, he also decided to ditch all the pumps and run the system without a condenser. “It all goes straight out the pipe,” he said. “Don’t need to worry about water consumption when you’re only going about four or five miles at a time.” A front fork from a mid-1970s Honda motorcycle and aluminum bodywork that Barnes built himself constituted the rest of the bike.
He finished the build in time to take the steam motorcycle to the East Coast Timing Association‘s speed trials last month in Wilmington, Ohio, where he aimed to double the claimed—if not recorded—top speed of Roper’s motorcycle his first time out with his bike, ultimately posting a speed of 80.4 MPH.
“I really wanted to go 100, but 80 ain’t bad,” Barnes said. “Somebody asked me if I was scared to go that fast, and yeah, I was scared to death—I ain’t stupid.”
Barnes said he plans to head back to Wilmington next year with the bike to see if he can go a little faster, but he doesn’t imagine his record will now inspire others to go land-speed racing atop steam-powered motorcycles. “No, I don’t think anyone else will do it,” he said. “At least, I hope they have the sense not to do it.”
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23 Responses to “Records are meant to be broken: 80.4 MPH on a steam-powered motorcycle”
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Paging Jay Leno…
I don’t really think I’d want to straddle that. Yikes.
Down south we see a lot of street vendors selling Boiled Peanuts.
I think in my case, I’d probably pee first, and the boiling part would come during the speed run. Especially since it is a lost water system and gets hotter the longer it runs.
Which Roper steam cycle did you “have in your shop?”
Perfectly safe, perfectly safe – IF you hydro tested it and keep an eye on that water level. Oh yeah, mind that pressure-relief valve; the first steam engine fatality was caused by a fireman who got tired of listening to the screech of a p-relief going off and so tied it down – OOOPS!
I think 100 mph is perfectly doable with a little tinkering, but in this age of the Go-Pro, a better video next time, pullleeeeeze?
A decent fairing would probably help things….
No paint, numbers, or decals?
I’m up for breaking the record for rubber band powered motorcycles.
Now I’ve seen it all
You would think so, but I doubt it.
Maybe u should use carbon fiber for the frame and for the fairing. U could also use carbon fiber for the condensing containers and the compressors if reinforced with stainless steel tube sock cover. Please let me know if that works. I’ve been working on my own formula. Thanks I hope to hear from u. DrFairSr.
Please stop using twitter language. Use the word “you”. What is “U” ?
A lucky horseshoe?
Whenever I see that someone typed U, I hear “ooo”. “Maybe ooo should use carbon fairing…”
Years back I met a guy at Eyes on the Classics who probably still is in the record books for taking a 60′s era Studebaker to some ungodly speed. I guess this is just one other way to stay in the record books for a long time if not forever.
Wouldn’t think that thing would be hot to lay on?
I believe Jay Leno’s super fast motorcycle is jet powered. He said it’s a wild ride to say the least!!
bill, good work, no matter what other say you did it,please consider that you sould you release the plans to the steam moter and flash boiler.
It’s not a flash boiler, just a standard Stanley fire-tube boiler. The engine is a standard Stanley 10hp engine. No special hardware, just a smart guy putting stuff together right and operating it right.
In the late 50′s there was a steam motorcycle housed in the Fisherman’s Wharf as a museum piece. It was a grand looking machine with posted record breaking speed. Any body remember that steam-cycle? Some how I remember it as claiming a 119MPH speed record.
Thanks for the reminder, it’s still there. I grabbed some low-quality pictures of it a while back. Will dig those up to see if I can make out any details.
Guys got GUTS! If he got rid of those 1930′s wheels and tires, he would easily break 100 mgh
As a veteran of more than 40 years restoring old bikes and riding them, I don’t think this record will last long. I’d build a steam bike and ride it, if I knew a bit more about steam! To go more than a hundred he’ll need between 45 and 55 hp. A Vincent Black Shadow with no fairing, 55 hp and a 440 pound curb weight was good for 120 mph. The problem, more than anything else, is weight, which has be kept to a minimum and still be safe enough to ride. I’ll bet there are several guys out there with plans already on the table.