It's so easy how is everyone so stupid. I'd invent the train afterward and drive around everyone saying "you're so fucking stupid I'm not even good at this and I did it".
It's so easy how is everyone so stupid. I'd invent the train afterward and drive around everyone saying "you're so fucking stupid I'm not even good at this and I did it".
The "Strong enough" being the operative problem. Probably can't do a Walking beam engine before the developments in metallurgy from early cannons, if not the 17th century metallurgical analysis of Wootz steel by European scientists.
Jet rotator engines work just fine though.
Metallurgy isn't the only problem, although it helps. Steel isn't strictly necessary unless you want safe high pressure and high heat boilers for more power and efficiency and fewer explosions. You could make almost an entire steam locomotive out of iron or bronze but it wouldn't be as light or durable or safe.
You also need technology like metal casting, forging, and precision machining. Plus enough industrial capacity to produce miles of nearly uniform tracks.
Maybe you could go straight from jet rotator engines to steam turbines and skip over piston engines entirely, but that would require a lot of the same technologies.