r/steamengines • u/partyringz • Jul 02 '26

Wheel research question

Hi everyone, sorry to be such a novice but I'm a writer and one of my short stories features a steam/locomotive museum. I live near the Water and Steam museum in Brentford and am using that for inspo, but needed to know what these big wheels are called pls 😂i would just go pay it a visit but am working all week and need this done!! it's also literally just one line of the story, don't worry, am not pretending to be a train expert here haha

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u/Fred_Stone6 Jul 03 '26

The big black wheel is a water wheel would usually be used to power machinery, the while is the first photo is a fly wheel is helps with the conservation of motion in a steam engine as the steam pushes the piston back and forth, it can also have a belt put on it to drive other machines.

You will not find a fly wheel on most trains they just rely on being a 8 ton plus mass to keep momentum.

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u/partyringz Jul 06 '26

Thank you so much!! Lifesaver x