An engine he created for pioneering aviator Samuel Pierpont Langley was heavily modified and used in a craft that has been considered one of the earliest heavier-than-air aircraft.
In the same year, he completed his first prototype automobile, a motorized quadricycle with a tube chassis, less than 3 by 6 feet (0.91 by 1.83 m).
[1] It had a rotary, air-cooled, 3-cylinder engine, mounted vertically in the rear and revolving around a fixed crankshaft.
Each front wheel had its own bicycle fork axle which were connected by a bar which was operated by a tiller.
When Smithsonian Institution Secretary Samuel Pierpont Langley learned about these vehicles and their engine in 1898, he contacted Balzer, ordering one for his experimental airplane.