Timed ignition and high-speed engines
Wealthy steam enthusiasts were often attracted to steam models, ranging from elaborate trains to standalone, small stationary engines. Some ran them as after dinner entertainment for their guests to marvel at. Unfortunately, the quality of many was appalling, with operators running serious scalding risks and worse, each time the engine was in steam.
Strolling down the Passage de Léon, Paris, the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion spotted a well-made model steam locomotive in the window of a small shop, where engineer brothers-in-law Georges Bouton and Charles Trépardoux worked hard to make a modest living building ‘scientific toys,’ many of which involved steam. At the time, Trépardoux was the more imaginative of the pair, often designing on paper full-size personal steam cars, wagons and more, projects their business couldn’t afford. Impressed by the quality of Bouton and Trépardoux’s work, De Dion commissioned them to make him a steam model train.
Further impressed by his model, Marquis De Dion offered the pair a partnership in a new company he’d form and fund, thus creating ‘De Dion, Bouton et Trépardoux of Paris’ in 1883. The new company developed steam engines for smaller boats, steam tractors, live axle systems with the weight carried by a stout tube encasing the revolving drive shaft, and much more.
Although enjoying steam, De Dion became more attracted to internal combustion engine designs and carried Bouton along with his enthusiasm. Trépardoux, a steam man through-and-through, resigned from
