in Paris alone, and production of Lenoir Gas Engines, by Reading Gas Works in London, had begun. Lenoir had completed work on his engine in 1859 and had a grand unveiling on 23 January 1860, for twenty guests. In his speech he said, "If it works, I will add carburetor heating, at a constant level, which will allow the use of petrol, or gasoline, or tar, or any resin". He turned on the illuminating gas valve, pushed the flywheel, and the engine came to life. In 1860, Lenoir received a patent for "an air motor expanded by gas combustion" from Conservatoire national des arts et métiers, no. N.43624 Lenoir's automobiles Dates vary from 1860 to 1863 on when Lenoir built his automobiles. It is apparent that he built a small carriage with his engine around 1860. His automobile of 1862 was capable of 3 kilometers per hour. In 1861, he put one of his engines in a boat. In 1863, Lenoir demonstrated a second three-wheeled carriage, the Hippomobile, little more than a wagon body set atop a tricycle platform. It was powered by a 2543 cc (155 in3; 180×100 mm, 7.1×3.9in) 1.5 hp, "liquid hydrocarbon" (petroleum) engine with a primitive carburettor which was patented in 1886. It successfully covered the 11 km (7 mi) from Paris to Joinville-le-Pont and back in about ninety minutes each way, an average speed less than that of a walking man (though doubtless there were breakdowns). This succeeded in attracting the attention of Tsar Alexander II, and one was sent to Russia, where it vanished; Lenoir was not pleased. In 1863, he sold his patents to Compagnie parisienne de gaz and turned to motorboats instead, building the first naptha, a Ligroin fueled four-cycle in 1888. Jules Verne wrote in his 1863 novel Paris in the Twentieth Century of boulevards crowded with horseless carriages, "the Lenoir machine applied to locomotion." Stationary engines Most applications of the Lenoir engine were as a stationary power plant powering printing presses, water pumps, and machine tools. They "proved to be rough and noisy after prolonged use", however. Other engineers, especially Nicolaus Otto, began making improvements on internal combustion technology, which soon rendered the Lenoir design obsolete. Fewer than 500 Lenoir engines of between 6 and 20 hp were built, including some under license in Germany. Electrical engineering In 1865, Lenoir returned to electrical engineering. He developed a new type of