List of Steampunk Tech

Aether
Aether is a classical element. In ancient times it was thought to be the forces beyond control. In the late
19th century, the term luminiferous aether was used to describe a medium for the propagation of light.
There’s a lot of room to use this mysterious element in everything from a power source to a scapegoat
for natural disasters. In Katie MacAlister’s Steamed, rayguns shoot superheated aether.
Analog Systems
In analog technology, a wave is recorded or used in its original form, where in digital technology the
analog wave is sampled at some interval, and then turned into numbers that are stored in the digital
device. What if we continued as an analog society instead of a digital one?
Automatons
An automaton is a self-operating machine (an autonomous robot). They could be anything from
elaborate clockwork singing birds (or killer ladybugs like inBlameless) to robot servants (like in Android
Karenina). They could be lifelike or stylized, maybe they even have a windup key in their back.
Difference/Analytical Engines
A difference engine is a type of mechanical calculator capable of computing complex equations. Most
analytical engine is a mechanical general-purpose computer using punch-cards or other analogue
devices. Basically it's the idea that computer age can begin 100 years sooner, by creating complex
clockworks capable of making advanced calculations. The majority of these designs featured a hand-
cranked device.
Vhicales

Flying Machines
Jules Verne enchanted us all with balloon travel in “Around the World in Eighty Days” and “Five
weeks in a Balloon.” But aircraft get even bigger like blimps, zeppelins, dirigibles, and airships.
They could be grand and elegant passenger ships of gleaming wood and polished brass, or could
be patched and clunky cargo haulers, or these vessels could be filled with the most fearsome
people to haunt Steampunk skies—air pirates!
They could be steam, helium, or hydrogen powered. Maybe they’re solar or run on aether.
But ships aren’t the only things that can fly. What about personal aircraft like “detachable
wings” – small powered gliders with wings reminiscent of a Da Vinci sketch or hoverboards?
And don’t forget the flying car or the flying city—or the genetically engineered airship made
from a Whale in Leviathan. Flying machines go beyond the dirigible and are only limited by the
imagination
 Balloons- Hot air balloons and zeppelins. A means of flying, used in some way in most
SteamPunk fiction that features massive airships or vast fleets of flying machines.
Submarines- The first American Submarine was invented during the civil war. The small
object was designed to get under English ships and drill holes in the bottom, but none of the
attempts succeeded.(23)
Submarines in SteamPunk fiction are yet another reason to thank the great Jules Verne. In
“20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” Verne's character Nemo designed a massive submarine to
explore the ocean depths and survive giant squid attacks.(30)
Submarines in SteamPunk fiction either deal past speculations of the unknown or the
technical problems of relying completely on a machine to protect ones life in an ocean
environment.
Ironclads-
Those metal battleships that got their start in the American Civil War. They inspired war fiction
of the period and are common in modern SteamPunk as locations for a story or weapons of war.

Steampower
Steam technology is the fundamental basis of Steampunk. Steam engines can power trains and boats or
run factory equipment or mills, steam turbines can produce electricity. Steam can power cars or farm
equipment, heat houses, power weaponry–it can even run clocks.
In a basic steam engine heat is obtained from fuel burnt in an enclosed firebox. The heat boils water in
a pressurized boiler, turning it into saturated steam. The steam transfers to a motor which uses it to
push on a piston sliding inside a cylinder, powering the machinery. As the steam cools it is exhausted
into the air.
There are all sorts of steam engines of varying sophistication, including underwater jet and rocket-type
engines. How about a steam-powered submarine?
Escaping steam and boiler explosions can call all sorts of devastation, disaster, and injury.
Antiquities-Victorian items like eye glasses and pocket watches really set the mood for a steam punk
story and give you a little information about the character who owns them.

Body Modification-
Mechanical body parts may be thought of as mostly a modern and futuristic sci-fi concept, but
SteamPunk stories often feature characters with artificial body parts. These can be simple bone or skin
replacements, like the character with an iron cranium on the movie “Wild Wild West”,(2) or movable
claws and limbs.

Weapons

Bombs-
Gunpowder, nitroglycerin, and sometimes TNT. They can work on fuses, impact detonation, or
retro clockwork timers to strike a spark on a fuse or shake up a vial of nitroglycerin.

Cannons-
Cannons have been around since before steam. Fictional super cannons may appear in a story,
such as the cannon that shot a man to the moon in Jules Verne's “From the Earth to the
Moon.”(3)
Cannons can often be found in flying fortresses to fend of pirates in SteamPunk.
Cannons may be sleek and professional or they may be something that some guy built in his
shop that shoots garbage.
Nitroglycerin- Nitroglycerin in SteamPunk, as with most inventions, can appear in any
decade the story might be set in, but the process of creating pure Nitroglycerin was perfected in
the 1860s by Alfred Nobel and a series of tragic explosions soon followed.(16)
These nasty explosives are popular in SteamPunk Westerns as well as regular westerns.
There are two reasons for this. First, it is an early technology, perfected not long after the end
of the American Civil War, and the second is that the pure form of nitroglycerin is just as
dangerous and combustible as it is presented in even the most over dramatic SteamPunk
Westerns, able to level buildings and blow trains apart like wet paper.
Sword Fights- It is a lot easier to find an excuse for a sword fight in SteamPunk fiction than
in most fiction set in present or future times. In the Victorian era gentlemen still dueled each
other with well laid out rules and if a pistol is out of reach or out of ammunition

Mech Suit-
More of a futuristic cyber anime concept, but a mech suit in a SteamPunk story would probably
be big and slow, requiring room for the steam engine, levers, and gears.
Mech Suits in SteamPunk would probably be built to help in heavy lifting and hostile
environment work, although guns could reasonably be added and a rocket could give a mech
suit the ability to fly.(14)
Chemistry-
Modern chemistry came about in the beginning of the Victorian era. The idea of turning lead into gold
was more or less over except for in the fringe of the community, but the science was still new enough
for some imaginative mutation and immortality potion stories.(4)

Clockwork -
Machines using elaborate clockwork can abound in Steampunk. They can be anything from automatons
to actually being the “heart” of a city. They could set off explosives, or run radios, trains, or analytical
engines.
Quite a bit older than steam technology. Clock work sometimes stands alone in its own ClockPunk
genre, usually set during the Renaissance and inspired primarily by Leonardo da Vinci.
Clock work is a necessity in SteamPunk and is interchangeable with steam technology. A robot might
have a steam engine or a wind up key, depending on the writers preference.

Difference Engines-
Or Analytical Engines. Difference engines were mechanical calculators designed to calculate complex
polynomials. The earliest designers were in the eighteenth century but the device was not actually
made until the nineteenth century. SteamPunk fiction uses the Difference Engine as an early form of
computer.(7)

Giant Machines-
Towering titans blotting out the sun with smoke. Typically the invention of a mad scientist, a secret
society, or countries at war.

Little Gizmos-
Cute little mascots made from old broken clocks or sinister swarms of predatory metallic insects. The
smaller machines tend to be clockwork instead of steam.

Magnetism-
There are a lot of things one can do with magnets, especially when one adds the artistic liberties of
pseudoscience.

Magnified Light-
Like burning ants under a magnifying glass. This idea can be taken to a ridicules degree in SteamPunk
with solar powered light cannons or heat rays.
Mirrors-
A well known tool of illusionists. Reflects light and images and number of mirrors positioned in just the
right way can make an image appear 3-dimensional.

Monsters- More on the fantasy side of SteamPunk. Monsters might mean using the antiquated
sciences of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries or giving no explanation for the existence of a
monster at all.
Homunculus
Darwinists (who have used genetics to modify animals in order to make them more useful).

Telescopes- Hans Lipperhey and Jacob Metius separately created the first known designs for a
telescope and failed to get patents in 1608.(26) In the same century Galileo designed a telescope of his
own and discovered four moons of Jupiter.(27)
In SteamPunk fiction telescopes can be portable accessories or massive constructions moved around
by gears and levers.

Trains- The importance of trains for the SteamPunk genre can not be over stated. Trains were the
first form of mass transportation, connecting whole continents and diffusing culture and information.
In SteamPunk fiction trains serve as mobile bases as in Wild Wild West,(2) a means of long range
transportation, especially in a SteamPunk Western, and a dramatic, if overused scene for the final
showdown between the hero and the villain.

Pharmaceuticals

Occult Magitech
Where science, theology, and magic are intertwined. Egyptian mythology, supernatural creatures
preserved in a jar,