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A pop-pop boat is a toy boat, which has a heat engine that works with the help of a candle or an oil burner. The boat has been named after the noise that it makes when it runs. The boat is also called a flash-steamer, putt-putt boat, pulsating water engine boat, crazy boat and hot-air boat.
According to official records, the very first pop-pop boat was made by Thomas Piot, a Frenchman, in 1891. He registered the first pop-pop boat in the United Kingdom and the boat worked with the help of two dischargeable tubes and a boiler.
Even though Piot is officially the first inventor of the pop-pop boat, an article written in 1975 by writer Basil Harley talks about a similar boat, mentioned in a journal published in France in 1880. This means that there was the possibility of the existence of pop-pop boats even before Piot filed his patent.
In an improvement to Piot’s pop-pop boat, an American inventor, Charles J McHugh registered a patent in 1915 for a similar boat with a diaphragm engine.
William Purcell invented the most popular engine for homemade pop-pop boats in 1920. He invented and patented a coiled-tube engine, which has become popular because of the simplicity of its construction. Apart from homemade boats, commercial boats also use this kind of engine as the cost is much lower.
Paul Jones invented another engine design that was popular with commercial boats in 1934. He invented another diaphragm engine, which was an improvement from McHugh’s design because it could be made using stamped parts.
The boats of the 1920’s were made with a single exhaust pipe. However, studies show that boats with two exhaust pipes are more common.
Even though pop-pop boats had been extremely popular during the 1940s-50s, they were not as popular when plastic toys came onto the market. However, they are produced even today, and are a collector’s item, based on the rarity of its design.
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