Hit and miss engine

Imagine you're playing with some blocks and you have a toy car that runs on fuel. The car needs to turn a wheel really fast to move. So, you connect a small engine to the wheel and pour fuel into the engine to make it work.

Now, the engine needs to turn a special part called a "flywheel" really fast to produce energy to move the car. This is where the "hit and miss" part comes in.

In a hit and miss engine, the engine "hits" a metal rod called a "governor" when it needs to speed up and "misses" it when it needs to slow down. The governor makes sure that the speed of the flywheel doesn't go too high or too low, which helps the engine run smoothly without breaking.

The engine also has a "mag" that makes sparks (like magic fire) to ignite the fuel and make the engine go "vroom vroom" just like your toy car.

Hit and miss engines used to be very popular a long time ago before electricity and big machines because they could be used to do a lot of work like grinding corn, making ice cream, or even pumping water out of the ground. They're not used as much anymore, but they're still really cool to watch!