Picture of the day
- Thread starter jwhc
- Start date
- Location
- West Quebec
Great photo..
Not sure about the guns but WW1 aircraft often used 2 stroke rotary engines. Yep the whole engine rotated around a stationary crankshaft, prop was bolted to the engine.
Exhaust just dumped out of the engine in front of you. Best part? 2 stroke right? Lubricants of the day were pretty limited; so Castor oil was added to the gasoline.
Do a little flying and dogfighting with your pursestring pulled up real tight because you've been inhaling Castor oil fumes.
After landing occasionally a pilot would scramble from the cockpit to the ground, hurriedly drop trousers and let loose.
Dogfighting while you need to crap really badly? That's some manly man stuff right there. The pilots would carry a flask of brandy to counteract the effects of Castor oils laxative tendencies.
killinger und freund
REALLY neat Bike. Three cylinder two stroke motor IN the FRONT wheel!
Rotated with the wheel. Just like early WWI figther aircraft engines rotating with the prop.
Steering must have been interesting.
http://www.way2speed.com/2012/03/killinger-and-freund-motorrad.html#axzz2YkWJKBzt
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Rifleman1911
CGN Regular
- Location
- Leduc county AB
Wow that's neat. No actual rotating crankshaft. Just an off centre bearing.
Rotary engine SOUNDS like nothing else in Creation.
I was fortunate enough in '67 to be standing right in front of a Pup as they started her and ran her up. Sounded like a Lawn-Boy on STEROIDS! Whole airplane rocked on its landing-gear as the engine was turned on and off, on and off, during warm-up. CLOUDS of castor-oil smoke, too!
Most of them had the throttles and mix-chokes wired full open, so the only way to control the engine was by grounding out the magneto: "blipping", they called it. Don't hit the "blip switch" and you were running, wide-open, whether you liked it or not.
At the Abbotsford Air Show in '67 they had 2 Avro 504-Ks, a Pup and a Thomas Morse F-1, all with rotaries. I wanted to take my Grandma to the show, but she pulled out at the last minute, telling me to go alone and saying, "I don't have to see them, dear: I MADE THEM!" And then my dear, sweet, veddy-English Grandma...... RAN THROUGH THE STARTING DRILL FOR A ROTARY FIGHTER ENGINE.
And that was VERY hard to argue with.
I was fortunate enough in '67 to be standing right in front of a Pup as they started her and ran her up. Sounded like a Lawn-Boy on STEROIDS! Whole airplane rocked on its landing-gear as the engine was turned on and off, on and off, during warm-up. CLOUDS of castor-oil smoke, too!
Most of them had the throttles and mix-chokes wired full open, so the only way to control the engine was by grounding out the magneto: "blipping", they called it. Don't hit the "blip switch" and you were running, wide-open, whether you liked it or not.
At the Abbotsford Air Show in '67 they had 2 Avro 504-Ks, a Pup and a Thomas Morse F-1, all with rotaries. I wanted to take my Grandma to the show, but she pulled out at the last minute, telling me to go alone and saying, "I don't have to see them, dear: I MADE THEM!" And then my dear, sweet, veddy-English Grandma...... RAN THROUGH THE STARTING DRILL FOR A ROTARY FIGHTER ENGINE.
And that was VERY hard to argue with.
Dark Alley Dan
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Darkest Edmonton
One should never argue with their mother. 
Here's an odd duck. Are those Lewis guns sans magazines?
Here's an odd duck. Are those Lewis guns sans magazines?
Dark Alley Dan
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Darkest Edmonton
Interesting. One doesn't often see them "topless".
I've read that the torgue on take off was tremendous, causing many rookie pilots grief until they learned to counter it.
Not only are the nasty little things TOPLESS (which is now legal in Canada), they are STRIPPED.
And in public, yet! And TWO of them the SAME!
WHAT is this world coming to? NO morals whatEVER!
(Grumble, grumble.....) Nexzt thing you know, they will be cuddling up to that ugly old Maxim, being ever so nice, seeing if he'll let them have a few rounds to play with.
A THREESOME in the gun room, I tell you, and two the SAME: shocking!
They're all the same, I tell you, all the same...... No morals at ALL, these youngsters today..... Whatever must their parents think.......
I still wouldn't complain if they moved in here!
And in public, yet! And TWO of them the SAME!
WHAT is this world coming to? NO morals whatEVER!
(Grumble, grumble.....) Nexzt thing you know, they will be cuddling up to that ugly old Maxim, being ever so nice, seeing if he'll let them have a few rounds to play with.
A THREESOME in the gun room, I tell you, and two the SAME: shocking!
They're all the same, I tell you, all the same...... No morals at ALL, these youngsters today..... Whatever must their parents think.......
I still wouldn't complain if they moved in here!
The torque effect with any of the rotary engines was something the pilot HAD to be on top of at ALL times and, the more powerful and heavier the engine, the moreso.
The Camel had a very heavy engine in relation to the weight of the rest of the airplane: cast-iron cylinders on aluminium crank-cases, engines running 130 to 150 horses. It was the most aerobatic fighter ever built, it was the undisputed Champ of WWI fighters and it was LETHAL to inexperienced pilots. Camels shot down 1,294 German aircraft and, the legend goes, killed almost that many of our pilots.
A Camel was wonderfully aerobatic: NO airplane ever made can make a Right turn inside the turn radius of a Camel. It ALSO would go into a Right Spin with very little provocation and recovery was EXTREMELY difficult. This killed a lot of pilots.
EXCELLENT book: NO PARACHUTE by (Air Vice Marshal Sir) Arthur Gould Lee. Available in paperback for many years, it is a re-creation, through an old man's personal letters and log books, of his year as a Camel pilot, beginning at a time when the life expectancy of a fighter pilot at the Front was TWO WEEKS.
ANOTHER good writer on aircraft in the Great War was ARCH WHITEHOUSE who was himself an Observer, Gunner and later a Fighter Pilot of some considerable renown.
The Camel had a very heavy engine in relation to the weight of the rest of the airplane: cast-iron cylinders on aluminium crank-cases, engines running 130 to 150 horses. It was the most aerobatic fighter ever built, it was the undisputed Champ of WWI fighters and it was LETHAL to inexperienced pilots. Camels shot down 1,294 German aircraft and, the legend goes, killed almost that many of our pilots.
A Camel was wonderfully aerobatic: NO airplane ever made can make a Right turn inside the turn radius of a Camel. It ALSO would go into a Right Spin with very little provocation and recovery was EXTREMELY difficult. This killed a lot of pilots.
EXCELLENT book: NO PARACHUTE by (Air Vice Marshal Sir) Arthur Gould Lee. Available in paperback for many years, it is a re-creation, through an old man's personal letters and log books, of his year as a Camel pilot, beginning at a time when the life expectancy of a fighter pilot at the Front was TWO WEEKS.
ANOTHER good writer on aircraft in the Great War was ARCH WHITEHOUSE who was himself an Observer, Gunner and later a Fighter Pilot of some considerable renown.
- Location
- West Quebec
Thanks
even regular engines, there is a reason that so many designers tried so many expensive counter rotation set ups
- Location
- West Quebec
That would be interesting to see...
That! appears to be a Bristol Bolingbroke/Blenhiem ... tho the landing gear looks not right. Many different variations of this aircraft - Grandad flew these as navigator/bombardier in Atlantic submarine patrols. He would have been lying prone behind those 2 little windows under the pilots feet.... no where else to go for the whole flight!! yiikes!
I have no idea what that bubble is, hard to tell if it is opaque or not... too small for radar by my guess.
Interesting, will have to dig up.
Great photo!
Well - I was wrong - it's a Bristol Beaufort [still related ] and I haven't found specific reference to it yet, but I suspect it is either a radio altimeter or gyro angling gear....
I have no idea what that bubble is, hard to tell if it is opaque or not... too small for radar by my guess.
Interesting, will have to dig up.
Great photo!
Well - I was wrong - it's a Bristol Beaufort [still related
] and I haven't found specific reference to it yet, but I suspect it is either a radio altimeter or gyro angling gear....
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