Abner Doble - Consultancy and Later Life

Consultancy and Later Life

With the demise of his company Doble went on to work as a consultant for other engineering companies all over the world. During the 1920s and 1930s Doble's engines were tried in steam buses. The first were tested in 1926 by International Harvester, using a Doble Model G engine, and the Detroit Motorbus Co, in a double decker, with a Doble Model H engine. A second Detroit bus had a Doble steam engine added in 1927 and at least one of them covered some 32,000 miles. In 1929 a Doble Model H was installed in a Yellow Coach for General Motors. This was followed by another Model F in a Fageol bus.

He went to New Zealand in March 1930 where he worked for A & G Price Limited at Thames on the development of a steam engine for buses. One was installed on an AEC chassis for the Auckland Transport Board to trial. The intention was that should the trial of the be successful more would be constructed. By 1932 the first had covered more than 20,000 miles and a second was ordered by a private company, White and Sons, for their Auckland to Thames Service.

In January 1932 Doble left New Zealand and went via San Francisco to England. There he was engaged as a consultant by the Sentinel Waggon Works of Shrewsbury, working on steam lorries and locomotives. Several shunting locomotives (switchers) and an undetermined number of railcars were fitted with Doble/Sentinel machinery for sale to customers in Britain, France, Peru, and Paraguay. In Germany, during the 1930s Henschel & Son buses, powered by the Doble steam engines, were operated. Doble left England in 1936. Also during this time he acted as a consultant to A Borsig Co of Berlin.

Doble was hired as the chief engineer for a new bus powerplant for the revived Stanley Motor Carriage Company in Chicago. In the middle of the project after the powerplant was actually built Doble left to Stanley's annoyance. Doble then did engine designs for Cleaver-Brooks, Nordberg (1946-1948), and Greyhound. After this he retired to Santa Rosa, California where he sold Electrolux vacuum cleaners to pay his living expenses.

Doble's consultancy also included in the development of the Paxton Phoenix car, for the Paxton Engineering Division of McCulloch Motors Corporation, Los Angeles. The project was for a low-weight car built around a unique "torque box" chassis based on an aeronautical wing section. The project was eventually dropped in 1954. He did design a steam car for Alex Moulton of England, but it was never built. He was a consultant on the Keen steam car in 1957 and a monotube boiler for Charles W Tadlock of St Louis in 1957.

For the remainder of his life, he maintained that steam-powered automobiles were at least equal to gasoline cars, if not superior. He died on 17 July 1961 of a heart attack, in Santa Rosa, California.