---
title: 'The Steam Video you have been waiting for….'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=i_nj_vkD03g'
video_id: 'i_nj_vkD03g'
date: 2026-09-13
duration_sec: 1541
channel: 'Linus Tech Tips'
---

# The Steam Video you have been waiting for….

> Source: [The Steam Video you have been waiting for….](https://youtube.com/watch?v=i_nj_vkD03g)

## Summary

The video documents a project to install a working steam engine into a Valve Steam Machine to cool it, addressing the lack of user fan control. The team modifies the console, attaches a steam engine, and tests its cooling performance under load, achieving lower temperatures than stock.

### Key Points

- **Critique of Steam Machine name** [00:00] — The video opens by criticizing Valve's naming of the Steam Machine, noting it lacks actual steam, and sets up the project to add a real steam engine.
- **Real purpose: fan control issue** [00:49] — Valve's design error: no user control of fan curve, causing thermal throttling for some users. The project aims to fix this with a 3D-printed fan and pulleys.
- **Steam engine acquisition** [02:01] — For about $300, they bought a single-cylinder steam engine from Locking Whale on AliExpress, rated for 0.015 horsepower and 600 g/cm torque, capable of ~3000 RPM.
- **Baseline temperature tests** [03:22] — Under load, GPU at 85°C, CPU at 83°C, fan at 1200 RPM. Highlights the Steam Machine's compact but not cool-running design.
- **Disassembly and 3D-printed fan** [04:38] — They disassemble the Steam Machine, noting the 3D-printed nylon fan (scanned from original) and swapping blade design with Noctua-inspired geometry for quieter operation.
- **Gear ratio setup** [06:42] — They plan to use gears to connect the steam engine to the fan, starting with 1:1 ratio, possibly moving to 3:1 for more fan speed while running engine economically.
- **Fuel and preparation** [10:17] — They use methyl hydrate as fuel (hottest burning fluid in shop) and steam engine oil containing animal tallow, ordered specifically for this project.
- **First steam engine test** [12:05] — After lighting the burner and building pressure, the engine runs, spinning the fan. They note the safety release valve and throttle control.
- **Cooling performance with steam** [15:03] — At idle, GPU at 37°C, CPU at 52°C. Under load with 1:1 ratio, temps dropped from 85/83 to 70/65, showing effective cooling.
- **Gear ratio change to 3:1** [17:23] — Switching to 3:1 ratio further improves cooling, with GPU at 50°C and CPU at 65°C at start, and temps dropping 10°C quickly under load.
- **Faceplate impact** [21:34] — Adding the front cover increases air resistance, raising temps slightly (GPU 84°C, CPU 76°C), but still lower than stock under similar conditions.
- **Final results and conclusion** [23:11] — With higher gear ratio, GPU dropped from 96°C to 81°C quickly, CPU to 61°C. They conclude it's louder, less sleek, and more expensive, but achieves lower temperatures.

### Conclusion

The steam-powered cooling solution successfully lowered temperatures below stock, albeit with added noise, cost, and complexity. The project demonstrates a creative, albeit impractical, fix for Valve's fan control limitation.

## Transcript

The Steam Machine has been a runaway success, but that's in spite of a critical, maybe even criminal, mistake from Valve. No, I don't mean the single-channel memory or the pedestrian performance. I'm talking, of course, about the name.
Steam Machine, where is the cut-dang Steam, Valve? I mean, the class-action lawsuit for false advertising practically writes itself. But worry not, Jayden, for we have taken it upon ourselves to right this terrible wrong and put the steam back in the steam machine.
Literally. This is a working steam engine, and when we're done, we'll be using it to put valves engineering back on the rails and cool our steam machine. Now, this might seem like a purely silly because-we-can project, and it is.
But it also serves a very real purpose. See, Valve did make one actual error in the Steam Machines design. They neglected to allow any user control of the fan curve, which has resulted in thermal throttling for some users.
So, by using a 3D printed fan and some pulleys, along with some help from Valve, this one, not that one, we are going to right this wrong once and for all. Or maybe we're going to waste a bunch of time and money, and hurt ourselves in the process.
Who knows? What I do know is how to segue. To our sponsor. You green! Their Magflow Pro is a liquid-cooled, T2-enabled, 25-watt power bank where you can see the liquid cooling in action. Whoa! Check it out at the links below!
This project was actually inspired by a discussion in our weekly writers meeting. I wanted to water-cool the CUC, to which I replied, SamSams did it! SamSams did it! And we actually have done. You pretty much name anything and we have water-cooled it at some point.
at some point. I wanted to do something new. The first reactions to my steam-cooled steam machine concepts were not good. No, they were not. But, but, as it so often does, AliExpress
saved the day. See, it turns out, for about $300, you can get a few hours of wholesome fun for the whole family and end up with your very own fully armed and operational steam
and Bessel engine station at the end of it. This particular one is a single-cylinder design from Locking Whale that is rated for up to 0.015 horsepower and 600 grams per centimeter of torque.
No idea what that equates to, but it says it'll do something like 3,000 RPM, which happens to be about two and a half times faster than the stock steam machine. So hopefully this thing will be suitable to amplify cooling.
The output, though, is just this rod right here. No electric generation is included, so we will need to make some modifications in order to actually use its power. We should also run some quick before tests just to see if what we're going to do, you know, even helps.
If it doesn't lower our temperatures, then it'll be clear why valve didn't go to set. Ah, yes. That would be the reason. One hundred percent. It wasn't efficient.
I'm going to get those tests going. All right. Let's get to it. Woo-hoo! I have some pics of what the idle temperature is like, but I want to see what it's like under load. Idle ain't the issue, brother. It might be an issue for our, you know, our steam engine.
Finding the right dial to keep it at, like, an idle constant going is actually really tough, because you end up using the steam, and your pressure reduces, and you can only build pressure at the same rate at which you can boil water.
Looking pretty good. GPU's at 85 degrees. Our CPU's at 83. and we're hitting 1200 RPM on the fan. This really highlights that the Steam Machine, while compact and quiet, is not the coolest running on the market.
Want to try one other game? Or do you think that's enough? I don't think it matters. Sure. Because as long as it's apples to apples... Yeah. Or steamed apples to regular steamed apples. Boiled apples is what I prefer. No, I prefer my hands steamed.
Okay. Speaking of Simpsons, did it? What? I've never seen Simpsons. It really doesn't want to go into surgery. I don't blame it. This is going to be a very elective thing.
You will not be better when we're done. Whoa, whoa, whoa. You don't know that. We're adding like a third arm. Faster, yes. Would you be more efficient with a third arm? If you were to have a third arm, where would you want it to grow?
I mean, you know, there's this. Have you actually taken this apart yet? No, I haven't. Okay. I assume I'm going to start with these screws. Correct. You only actually need one vision screwdriver.
lgtscorer.com I was going to say one bit. Oh, there you go. Oh. Those are captive, those two. Oh, okay. And then you need to undo four more. The feet. So get out those feet. Why show them a fan? Oh, yes. This fan right here is 3D printed on our SOS printer,
which means it's actually made of nylon, which is one of the same materials the screwdriver, like the OG screwdriver was made of. And the way that we achieved, you know, getting the exact same model for this fan is we had Taze from the lab 3D scan it,
And Justin just cleaned up a new 3D modeling software. 3D scanning software has gotten good enough where you can just, like, take a real-world object, like this fan, and create a one-for-one, like-for-like.
Also, at the same time, not to us, release the files. Ladies and gentlemen, we got him. For the geometry of their fan blades, not quite exactly the same.
and obviously you won't have their high-quality motors necessarily, but we were actually able to swap out the original brake design with a Noctua-inspired one to, I don't know, maybe it'll run a little quieter?
Oh, I really doubt that. We'd have no way of measuring it over the sound of that steam engine. But a girl can dream, right? The point is this worked out really well, because while Valve has done a pretty good job of partnering with iFixit
to provide replacement parts, There currently is no way for us to get our hands on another one of these fans, short of buying another steam machine, which there is no way for us to get our hands on. Let's, uh...
Do not put it on that end. Thank you. Oh, God, there's a board there. Yeah, you'll break these ends off. That's crazy. Yeah. What you're going to want to do is we're going to need to remove the antennae. These two. You need to remove this front daughter board Sure To get at it I Linus monster There Linus monster There we go And that that There our power supply
There's another daughter board. The main board is sandwiched in between. You know, getting at the SSD, not bad. Getting at the RAM, a lot of the painting, really impressive. It even gets all the details, like little
standoff points or whatever. Alright, let's talk about gears. To hook our steam machine up to our steam machine. First we boil water, that creates steam, which drives this piston right here,
and then the flywheel right here, the weight, keeps the momentum going during the pitch and trough of our piston's movement where there is no power generation. Now normally, this shaft here would drive something like a belt propeller or the wheels on a train,
but instead, we're going to hook up one of these gears. Then, we're going to hook them up to pose to turn our fan. So by using a combination of different gear sizes that we can attach either here on the steam engine or here on the fan hub, we can actually create
a number of different gear ratios. One to one should be fine to start with, but I suspect we're probably going to end up with like a three to one because we actually need to get up to 9000 RPMs. I'm totally kidding. It's more so we can run our engine more economically
at a lower RPM, but then obviously still spin the fan faster than the Valve could normally do it. Right. Yeah, get rekt, Valve engineers. I think we should stick with the middle gear first. So let's get this one off. Okay, middle gear solid.
Before I attach it, though, we actually want to put the whole fan back on, because otherwise we won't be able to get the back plate over whatever gear, so... See, when the parents of Valve's engineers look in the mirror and they go,
what mistakes did we make? A not steam-powered steam machine is at the top of that. You gotta wonder, does Valve see stuff like this and go, yes, cool, very smart.
Gaben is relaxing on a jog toy. What an idiot. I actually think that the folks at Valve would be very into something like this. Why don't you message Gaben? You should email him. I have, I did.
I tried to get him on to build a PC and I did not get a reply, which means no. The back of the machine is more c***ing colored than it used to be. Don't include that. You know you love it. We are gonna release the...
How many? Where did this come from? I have one extra screw. Uh... Oh, there we go. Yeah. We're more efficient than the Valve engineers, that's all that means.
Why do they need so many? I also am realizing a problem now. The screws that we would normally screw on the backplate are captive. We can just sit there. We can get a captive screw out. No, no, I don't wanna like ruin it that hard.
No, no, it's fine. I forget what they're called, but it has a little, um, thingamaboo on it, and now it's almost off. No, stop. Yeah, see, I have it. I didn't even lose it. So now we can put it back on, and it could be self-captive once more.
No, stop taping it. That's so janky. Yeah, but I- it's not janky. Oh, this isn't janky! Oh, editor, insert the part where the steam machine explodes.
No, look, look, it screwed in, it screwed in. It crashed. Yeah, it's completely- No, it's not because you're casing it. I'll take you. There, look at that. Quality modification. This is about to get so bad. I have not actually seen this steam engine fired up yet. I finished
the model and I went, okay, I can't wait to try this out. Turns out you need steam engine oil. So I look up steam engine oil. I go, okay, well, what's the easiest, quickest replacement for steam
engine oil? Nothing? Because steam engine oil, aside from, you know, having the correct weight for steam engines, contains animal tallow. So I had to order this from all the way down in the state to be used once for this project and then never again. You cannot make steam without heat.
So we've got to put alcohol in this little alcohol burner that sits under the water boiler inside the black tank. Love it, Elijah. We made one slight modification. Not alcohol, methyl hydrate though. We tried actually a couple different fluids to see which one will burn the hottest and this is the hottest one we have in the shop.
So, oh, I think we're getting there. Yeah, I think that's good. Okay, the next thing we do And this was nowhere in the instructions I had to look up another hobbyist channel to find out where to put these steam engine wheels. It goes in here.
How much do we need? Like not a lot is my understanding. She full? She full? She full. I hardly know it. I was thinking whatever this makes sense. Who cares? It's so funny. We're steam cooling a steam machine.
So we gotta light the burner before we slide it in the butt. You need to add water as well. Oh right, where's my water at? Now I think the capacity of this machine is about 200 milliliters. So I'll just eyeball it. Dang. Almost.
And done. Do we want to just fire it up before we... Yeah. Okay. This is a safety release valve right here. This is effectively our throttle. This controls how much of our steam is going to come out of here and drive the piston.
We can't even fire this up until we reach around, I think it's like 3 to 4 kilograms per centimeter squared. Okay, you ready? Hand's not on the trigger.
I didn't see it on fire! It was testing! Yeah, it's on fire Elijah! I don't see it. It is burning. Is it? I'm like... It's definitely on fire.
I don't hear it. It is on fire. Oh. Oh! She's going to burn more as it gets not overfilled. I did overfill it a little bit.
There you go, I guess. And now we play the raiding game. Oh, yeah. It's making a little bubble fart. I have seen a bubble fart.
It's starting to go up pretty decently now. It's going. She's boiling. Now we're getting pressure buildup. Two. Three. You get to... Yeah, well, it can't start on its own. It's not that sophisticated.
We actually have to give it kind of like a... Also, fun fact, this little switch here lets it go in either direction. Oh, okay. Yeah, but you have to stop it in between switching.
Okay so we going to go this way Oh wow There you go Oh okay It kicking off like something Is it Does it sound like it Wow did that burn through your glove Nope Okay
Is that pressure valve not working properly? We may not be able to build pressure. That would be very trace unfortunate. You know what? Let's do the test fire anyway.
Whoa! Oh, how you doing there, buddy? Holy s***. Whoa! I'm shaking. Whoa! Whoa! Okay. This is going to sound like a dumb comment. It does sound like an engine.
I was just kind of like, I don't know what I expected. Well, she's clearly working enough to spin a fan. Can we give it a shot? I put in way too much steam engine oil. You can see it kind of crapping out the exhaust pipe. That's fine. Yeah. I'll just take a little
piece of shop towel here. Let's give it a shot. I mean, what are we waiting for? Let's We're going to use the vice here. Team manager goes there. We got the police belt. Can you bring it any closer? Don't worry about it.
If you could obtain me something about the thickness of a PC cooling fan. Let's get them toward the front of the steam machine. So it's kind of hanging off of the belt. Oh, I see. Yeah. Yeah, because that will keep the tension on it. Okay. Here's your power. We're putting it right under where the water is going to drip, but that's okay.
Okay. And what makes that okay exactly? That stinky release valve is definitely not supposed to be releasing right now. I don't want to mess with it while it's very hot.
We're only able to build to about 2.5. But realistically, I think we've got plenty for what we're trying to do. It just affects my ability to open the throttle up more. We should start cooling it very quickly here.
Oh, that's a lot of water. All the paper is held. No. It's good, it's good, it's good. She's good, she's good. She's good, she's good. Oh my God!
Oh my God, it's so amazing! This is so much better than I could have possibly hoped for. Oh my goodness. This is the most f***ing posty thing that we have done in years.
We're on idle right now and our GPU is at about 37. Our CPU's at 52. Hold on. Oh! The CPU went down by one degree!
But we- no, it's back up, never mind. Okay, okay. Is it a fan? It's going, it's blowing air! Yeah? Whoa! Wait, that means we're going the wrong way! Okay, switch, yeah, switch the direction.
Okay. Yes. Now it's flowing the correct way. Okay, we're at the same. I'll give her a little bit more beans.
Oh! We got the CPU under 50 for the first time. Alright! Let's go, boy! It's about 4950. It's bouncing back and forth. That was the coldest it had been yet. I'm running out of pressure here. I'm going to idle her for a little bit.
Let's fire up a game and see how we do at the 1 to 1 ratio. I suspect the answer's going to be not very good. Then we throw the 3 to 1 on and see how we do. All right. Okay. She's blowing heat.
Oh, totally. There's absolutely heat coming off that. Hold on. You're kind of... Yeah, yeah. It's shooting a lot of shmoo that I'm a little worried about. Gabe, we'll send us a new one, correct? No. Oh.
I asked them if I could even buy a second one in the lead up to the embargo, and they completely ghosted me. I can't wait for this one to break the Steam Frame subreddit. It's like, wow, we've got Linus steam cooling the Steam Machine before the Steam Frame.
Oh. I will say this. Our solution does turn gaming into a two-man operation. No, it's gaming with a friend now. That's the only difference. Uh-huh. Turn any game into a friend slot. Okay, I am about to go to the same area where I was.
Give me a second here. Wait, what was our temperatures? Uh, 85 on GPU and 82, 83 on CPU. What? We're at 70 on the GPU. And 50... Oh, no, 65 on the CPU.
Shut up. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, I'm going to double check the settings. No, it's still 4K, and our texture quality is still set on medium. It's actually cooling it better.
There's no way. That's crazy. We have no idea what RPM it's spinning at. We don't know where the tachometer is. I would ask a bunch of people today, and they don't know where it is. All right.
Can you crank it if we have enough pressure built? Elijah, I can literally crank that. Hit me. I am your soldier boy. Well, it started to heat up. What?
I think it's just because we've been playing a little longer now, because I'm at 80 on the GPU and 70 on the CPU. That, dude, that looks so f***ing cool. Now that we're bound by the rate at which we can boil new fluid,
you can hear it. It's turning down a little bit. We're getting up to like 82, 83 on the GPU. We might need more speed. Let's change our gear ratio. So we're going to put this on the output of our steam machine, and this on the fan hub of our steam machine.
And that should really rip it. Oh my God, I love this. Like a greasy, wet, steamy love. Okay, thank you for that. Oh, we might need more water. We're almost out of water.
Okay, let's shut her down. Yeah, I'll turn the steam machine. Wait, which steam machine? You turn that steam machine off and I'll turn this steam machine off. I gotta let off a little steam first. What an evolution of technology. How this became this.
This is just made of TTU which is kind of like a more rubbery material. And you can actually just have a program that says how many teeth do you want and how much spacing. And it will just make the belt for you. Linus you need to start that. Right, what are you at?
We're at 74 on the GTU and 92 on the CTU. You went in the GTU. Okay. Oh god, ew. Oh my god, that's a lot.
That's hot. No, no, stay with the water. There's more paper towel there. No, no, I got it, I got it. Okay. Okay, how you doing, how you doing?
Tense, tense. We got this. Oh I came down I at under 70 on the GPU and about 80 on the CPU Whoa Oh that is way more air She blown
There's some air coming off of that. I need so little on the top gear in order to really spin that thing. Like, you can see it. She's a little hot and bothered. I would be too if you're touching it like that. Our temperatures are the lowest they've been, though.
Well, lowest we're starting this time. 50 on the GPU, 65 on the CPU. I'm going to start walking around here. We're still a bit warm. Don't worry about it. But you can ramp the speed up. Oh, yeah.
I'm barely even going. Yeah. I'm not even sweating yet. I mean, I'm like splooging all over the place. But sweat, no. What's our pressure like? Our pressure's not great, honestly. We're only around 1 kg per cm squared.
But that's okay. Because we were at like half before. Oh, okay. I can give her more. I just want to see where we end up with like a sustainable, I could run this till I run out of fuel.
Because our GPU is at 75 right now, buddy. Yeah, and our CPU is at about 6.7, 6.9. Like, this is lower than what we were doing before. This is the lowest we've seen yet. Can I be honest?
While louder than the stock steam machine, it's not as bad as I thought it was going to be, at least at this point. It is a way cooler sound. Do you want to crank her up?
Before we do that, I actually want to put the front cover on. Because we were kind of hacking a little bit before. But I think we can beat Valve Solutions even with the cover on. It did go up a tiny bit when you put it on.
We're above 80 on the GPU now and about 76, 77 on the CPU. So it's adding a little bit, well, a significant amount more air resistance. We're at 84 on the GPU, 76 on the CPU.
Nothing's changed. I mean I can tell you she's low in heat. It's not really changing much. Reverse jack. Wait, she's gonna go to 82. Oh, 69 on the CPU! Nice. Oh, we're at 66 on the CPU!
Oh, never mind, 70. I think we put too much water in and so it's hard to build pressure. The higher gear ratio and the additional air restriction is definitely making a difference.
She's struggling to push. Hold on, I'm gonna... Okay, let's just remove this again. How do we do without the faceplate? Still about 82 on the GPU, but we're under 70 on the CPU now.
81 on the GPU. 80 on the GPU! It touched 80 on the GPU! 70 on the CPU. So it's within like a degree or two right now. Slightly better performance. Way more work than it's worth.
Okay, I'm going to run the bare minimum so that we can hopefully build some pressure again. I'm kind of impressed with how low of an RPM you can go on this thing. Well that's the purpose of the flywheel, right? Yeah.
It keeps it going until the next power stroke. Wow, it looks so cool when you have it running really slow. Oh yeah, dude. Now I assume we're getting a little bit hotter. Yeah, 88 on the GPU, but we're still at about 65 on the CPU.
But I am building pressure again. I'm up to about one and a half. we will have way more scenes because we will longer run at higher RPM because some of the water's gone. Oh, I need a little longer, Captain.
We're at 71 on the CPU. I don't know how much longer we've gone. I need a little longer, Captain. To 95 on the GPU. I'm almost at 2. So is this you charging before like a CS2 game?
I think so. I remember when you were like ready to compete. I am fully charged. Oh, 96 on the GPU. Okay, okay, let's give her. Here we go. Oh, it's red. The light is red on the steam machine because we're overheating. No, no,
we got this. We got this. Come get a close up. Get a close up of this. This is crazy. Oh my god, we're coming down so fast. We're at 88 now. I'm 87 on the GPU. 86 on the GPU.
61 on the CPU, 85 on the GPU, 84! Let's gooooo! It came down 10 degrees pretty much like that. 81. Or as I call it, an LTT win. Sure, it might not be as quiet. It might not look as
sleek. It might cost way more. But did we get slightly lower temperatures? Yes. Yes, we did. And are we going to segue to our sponsor? I'm killer
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That makes one of us when you watch a shop for printers that was a surprisingly entertaining little coding I Think we better turn this thing off She's running out of steam you might say