<P> Many engine manufacturers made hit - and - miss engines during their peak use--from approximately 1910 through the early 1930s when more modern designs began to replace them . Some of the largest engine manufacturers were Stover, Hercules, International Harvester (McCormick Deering), John Deere and Fairbanks Morse . </P> <P> A hit - and - miss engine is a type of flywheel engine . A flywheel engine is an engine that has a large flywheel or set of flywheels connected to the crankshaft . The flywheels maintain engine speed during engine cycles that do not produce driving mechanical forces . The flywheels store energy on the combustion stroke and supply the stored energy to the mechanical load on the other three strokes of the piston . When these engines were designed technology was not nearly as advanced as today and all parts were made very large . A typical 6 horsepower (4.5 kW) engine weighs approximately 1000 pounds (454 kg). Typically, the engine material was mainly cast iron and all significant engine parts cast from it . Small functional pieces are made of steel and machined to perform their function . </P> <P> The fuel system of a hit - and - miss engine consists of a fuel tank, fuel line, check valve and fuel mixer . The fuel tank most typically holds gasoline but many users would start the engines with gasoline and then switch over to a cheaper fuel such as kerosene or diesel . The fuel line connects the fuel tank to the mixer . Along the fuel line, a check valve keeps the fuel from running back to the tank between combustion strokes . The mixer creates the correct fuel - air mixture by means of a needle valve attached to a weighted or spring - loaded piston usually in conjunction with an oil - damped dashpot . </P> <P> Mixer operation is simple, it contains only one moving part, that being the needle valve . While there are exceptions, a mixer doesn't store fuel in a bowl of any kind . Fuel is simply fed to the mixer, where due to the effect of Bernoulli's principle, it is self - metered in the venturi created below the weighted piston by the action of the attached needle valve, the method used to this day in the SU carburetor . </P>

Who built a one cylinder gasoline engine in 1895