Welcome...What follows here is the build-up of a steam powered anti-hysteria machine. Please, won't you take a look around?

I enjoy steampunk projects and have wanted to work on another Victorian-era inspired project ever since we finished our Burning Man art car for the 2007 season. Check it out here. Update there's also a link to our newer art car from BM 2010.

There have been plenty of Steampunk creations in the tubes that are simply pretty things to look at, with a bunch of gears and valves randomly stuck on. Here is something different.

The Steam Actuated Soul Satisfier. A marital aid. Enjoy.

IT'S ALIVE!

Here it is finished, and in PG action.

HERO PICTURES

Full shots of the finished project.

FINAL DETAILS

Thrust mechanism.

 Closer.

 From below.

FINAL DETAILS

Close up of the the pre-charger and splash shield.

Splash shieled from other side with water tank detail.

Full shot.

FINAL DETAILS

Controller. Lights, dial and button all work. 

 Controller side

FINAL DETAILS

Warning...

 Operator point of view.

 Side of main control box. Detail of mercury control switches.

FINAL DETAILS

Here's the barrel pressure tank. I've called it a number of things. But in reality it's the electric motor cover.

 A close up shot of the air intake below the platform.

 Platform with brass nameplate.

FINAL DETAILS

Brass and leather accessory holder in the platform.

Operator control handle out front.

 Close up detail of the front of the water tank, showing pressure gauge.

Wiring

Now that all the pieces are in place the wiring begins.

Under control

Here's the inside of the controller with the PWM and the lithium battery from the drill.

Mover and shaker

I've been using all sorts of different motors and power supplies over the year. But I had to find something that works and commit. I found a lithium ion powered 12v drill with two small battery packs. Here are the parts I salvaged from the drill. The motor went into the wooden barrel and the battery will fit into the old train transformer.

And here's the more powerful PWM that I bought to run it all.

Just painted

Here's the compressor piston that I'm calling a pre-charger. All the non brass parts painted. Ready for mounting.

And here's the splash shield painted. It's made of brass but my soldering work was so bad I felt it needed paint to fix it. I used brass toilet hinges to mount the shield to the platform.

Clamp down

Finally got all the parts together in place on the platform. With the copper frame clamped on. Many of the items are now painted.

Brass control plate

I found an old brass sconce from the 80's that was brushed and ugly on one side. On the other side was unfinished and had developed an awesome patina. Here it is cut out to match the original plate.

Platform stained and mounted

All your base are belong to us

Using wood scraps that I salvaged from a client's basement I fashioned a platform. It a nice tight tongue and groove hardwood. It's gonna look nice stained.

Getting control

I found this train transformer at the flea market. I hope to make it the remote speed controller for the device.

Brass Everywhere

Here's some more pictures of the smaller details. Combining lamp parts, air compressor parts and some plumbing and electrical. No paint yet.

More of the detaily stuff

This is a close up of the piston that generates the hydraulic power to spin the motor. That's how it's supposed to be interpreted anyway. It does spin around and pump a piston. The basis of this is the main park of another broken air compressor. Note to self, stop buying cheap air compressors.

Here's a wider shot that shows the water tank in the background. To the left is the exhaust stack made from the mouthpiece of a cheap circular horn and another car bracket.

Nighttime report

Late night shot with more added details. I've added a mercury switch home thermostat (tan piece) to the side of the main case.  You can now see the wiring for the electrics that I'm hiding in the copper plumbing. I've got a working motor in the wooden barrel. But I'm having problems getting the motor to work consistently at slow speeds. I've got a PWM controller for the motor but it seems to be unhappy.

XXX action

So you might have noticed that I've changed the orientation of the lever device. It used to stand up from the surface of the board. But I found it difficult to support. And it occurred to me that a manufacturer wouldn't have built it this way for the same reason. So it now lays down and is attached to the board. The ugly board, by the way, is only temporary until I get the prototype figured out. Then I'm switching to a shaped piece of hardwood. I also eliminated the stands for the motor housing and integrated it into the support for the swing arm. It all came together into a nice clean set up.

Some new details

 Here's a close up of the motor housing and it's supports.

I really like this strut detail. The adjustable threaded thing is from a power seat from the Explorer I cut up for our second art car. It's designed to look like a tensioner for the motor housing. It's attached to an abs outdoor electrical box mounted on a car speaker frame. I still need to pick all the final finishes for the parts that aren't already brass or copper.

Close up Copper

Here's a close up of the major mechanics of the device.

That's Italian!

Here's a spaghetti tube that I found at the flea market. I've soldered the top to the bottom and added a lamp part for the new top. Handmade clamps hold the top on.

First time mounted

I finally got all the large pieces together. Looks like a machine gun. Hopefully it will go like one! The wood is temporary.  The copper frame underneath now supports the mechanics.

I heard the news today, Oh-boy!

Sex machine news.

From the article:
On March 9, the St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Office was notified of a Lexington Park, Maryland woman, reportedly aged 27, who was flown to Prince George’s Hospital for an injury which occurred on March 8, as a result of a sexual act involving the use of a reciprocating saw. The original 911 call was dispatched as a medical emergency.
St. Mary’s County Bureau of Criminal Investigation Detectives conducted an investigation which determined the injury was a result of a consensual act between two parties and no crime was committed.

---

At approximately 1:30 a.m. on Sunday, March 8, units from Bay District Fire Department and Lexington Park Rescue Squad responded to a call for a woman bleeding in Lexington Park.
A man told authorities that he had placed a sex toy on a saber saw blade and that the blade had sawed through the plastic and severely wounded the woman. Trooper 7 transported the woman to PG Hospital. The case remains under investigation at this time. No word on the condition of the woman at this time.

I built a wooden 'tank' with brass ends to hide the electric motor that drives the device. And looking to mount the motor on a nice base I hand made these pedestals. I didn't anticipate the forces the motor would be generating.

So then I made a stronger mount.  Not enough. And here I sorta got into hiding hearts in the  design. I made two of each of these. All made by hand with a scroll saw. In the end I dumped them all. I just didn't like how they looked. I ended up using copper!

Hiding the modern

New wooden barrel to hide the electric motor.

Special delivery

Got this in the mail today.

It's a vac-u-loc adapter to use Doc Johnson sexual aids with power tools. This particular piece is designed to be attached to a drill.

In all my travels I've never come across a woman that wished for a penis spinning at 300 rpm's.

No matter. It's going to work nicely for this application. And save me a lot of time.

A new machine

I've had to do some adjusting to my machine. I wanted to lengthen the stroke so I remounted the crank arm farther out on the wheel. This exaggerated a small flaw in my engineering into a large one . The bottom of the see-saw actually moves in a circular path. Like a child on a swing. This flaw was pointed out to me by friends. So I had to add a universal joint at the bottom of the see-saw. This allows the system to move smoother. And it allowed the overall stroke to reach 4 3/4 inches. Which will suffice. It's still only powered by a drill.

Getting down to business

Everything is coming along nicely. Pictured here is the mock up of the business end of my machine. The left side is the rod that will connect to the machine and the right side, at the two screws, will have the adapter for insertion.