History Auto racing 1894-1942

Pure copper has a higher melting point, 1984degF, than brass 1650F or maganese bronze 1600F. Normal exhaust gas temps are 1250-1300F. Steel is about 2600F.

 

This Monroe engine appears to have finger followers and a 38 degree VIA, 70 years before they were found to be near ideal. Planche or Van Ranst ? The earlier engine may be the clue.


Paul[/QUOTE]

Paul, Although I am far from finished researching true Frontenac racing engines (as opposed to the Ford based units) I believe the 300 inch and the 3 liter engines are quite different. Although Planche may have had a hand in much of what Louis did on the 300 inch motors I am not sure I can give him credit on the valve train. It seems whenever I try to give anyone credit for OHC valve arrangements during the teens that someone else actually used the same principles on an earlier engine. I believe Louis concentrated on the use of aluminum and saving weight. I have read his 300 inch motor weighed 390lbs and his whole 1916 racecars weighed 1600lbs (less oil, grease and water) which was reported to be 500 to 1000 lighter than the competition. His use of bevel drive for the cam was not novel as Mercedes used it, but Louis did alright with it.

During my correspondence with Ed Roy he sent me a 1921 article on the 1920 racing engine written by Louis and Van Ranst (SAE Transactions Part 1 1921-Indiana Section Paper). In re to the article they discuss the followers but not the angle: "The valve actuating mechanism consists of a finger having a curved surface forming the section of a roller upon which the cam rides. This finger is to take the side thrust. Between it and the valve-stem proper there is a straight piece of steel that might be called a tappet. This is the only means of adjustment and is ground to give the proper clearance. This makes a very light valve mechanism and needs very infrequent adjustment."

I am also enclosing a pic of the 300 engine and some drawings from the Automobile-Jim

 

I wasn't talking about Automotive Antifreeze

Sand is fine for steel

 

http://history.gmheritagecenter.com/wiki/index.php/History_of_Louis_Chevrolet

 

I was talking about cadmium in Wood's metal

 

I wasn't

I was talking about forming copper intakes and exhausts.

Woods metal has nothing to do with the forming of these items

 

Take a look a the picture onelung posted above, odds are it's been used for bending too.

 

Not bending. Wood's is used to produce bends which is a very different thing

I was answering Mac's question which had nothing to do with electroforming

Everyone of these manifolds I've had my hands on we're formed(hand bent)

I don't think electroformed bits would take the stress of an engines pressure and pulse

Onelung's referance to Wood's was clearly not how these items were made.

Electroforming like sand bending were around when these manifolds were made ..... and to be sure some may have tried with little success. But again I was answering his question not speculating on any 'might have been'

This is more like silver smithing rather than making silver flatware.

 

'A common use is as a filler when bending thin-walled metal tubes'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood's_metal

so when did freezing come into vogue?

 

Please do a Google search

 

It seems whenever I try to give anyone credit for OHC valve arrangements during the teens that someone else actually used the same principles on an earlier engine

Jim,

I agree, there is some mystery in all of this that makes it interesting (to me). I was referring to the 1915 "Iron" DOHC engine, not the 1916 "Aluminum" SOHC engine. Borgeson claimed that the 1920 Monroe DOHC was a copy or update by Van Ranst of the earlier "Iron" engine by Planche after the "Aluminum" engine was a disappointment. My real question is if the iron engine had the narrow finger followers and a 38 degree VIA, where did Planche get these ideas ? Henry's Ballot cup type followers were copied by Miller and others up through the Offy, Cosworth, Honda and Ferrari GP engines, but before the pneumatic valve took over, Honda proved the finger follower was superior. The finger follower showed up on the Delage and pre war MB, but was much less used. The narrow VIA really didn't catch on until the 60's with the Gurney-Westlake and later the Cosworth, and it is now clearly recognized as a better design for several reasons. What more do we know about Planche and what was his role at Mercer ?

Paul

 

That was from 1922 Who's Who in Engineering.
There is a little on Planche in Automobile Quarterly Vol34 No3, which I don't have.
He published a short paper on 'Design of Gas Engine Cylinders' in a SAE Bulletin 1916.
His work with Chevrolet is fascinating. Would like to know more.

 

Right about that time he did design work for Dort (GM) of Flint, Michigan for their 1917s. NY Sun, October 1, 1916. I didn't have time to clean it up, but here is a cut down OCR of the article.

It may give you some extra leads for your reaserch knowing he was there.

Vintageride


SILVER WILL SELL DORT CAR

Will Introduce New Car For Tomorrow in Connection With Full Chalmers Display
Big Metropolitan Dealer and Hit New Acquisition.

<O......It combines in Its makeup, and at a moderate price, most
an the quality talking points of the big;
expensive cars. Ettenne Planche formerly
of the Peugeot Company, designed
the motor, and he has built into the compact<O</O
engine more power than can be<O</O
found in other small cars.......

 

The Stutz engine designed by Wisconsin in 1916 looks similar to the Frontenac above. Notice the ball bearing crank, single cam, narrow valve angle. Who actually designed this?

 

Lee I suppose to dance around your question God only knows who designed these engines. Everyone knows of the history of Peugeot but if that is analyzed they did not originate every design they used in their engines either. Mercedes taking the top three spots at Lyon in 1914 with a aero type design SOHC did an admirable job and design firms in the US relied on this principle I am sure.

As to who takes credit for the design of the Wisconsin, In 1917 Charles John, the president of Wisconsin gave credit to his chief engineer, "directly after the Indianapolis speedway race of 1914 we agreed to build for Mr Stutz four engines that could compete successfully with foreign made engines. Our engineer, A.F. Milbrath, had sketched out some ideas which met with Mr Stutz's approval and we immediately started to work on the engines." (The Automobile Journal 2/10/17).

Keep in mind though that L.C. Erbes, Burman's money man sued Wisconsin about this time for stealing their designs of a Peugeot DOHC engine (which I believe is the engine that ended up in the Newman Stutz). Everyone was pretty much helping themselves to other's designs on both sides of the pond (although at this time the Europeans were concentrating more on foxholes I suppose).

Paul as to your comments on the Frontenac Iron engine, I believe we discussed this many pages back in maybe a small way. I have that same picture of the iron engine that Borgeson refers to in his Twin Cam book that I believe was a copy from Fred Usher. We discussed this engine and others including the Miller iron engine and the Milacs in minor detail back in the eighties. We sadly came up with zero in the way of smoking guns on any of them. I believe I have asked if you had any other pictures of this Frontenac Iron engine. What I do not understand with Borgeson is his timeline. Planche was a busy man at the time he had him working with Louis in lets say late 1914 and 1915. Borgeson claims that Louis started working on his aluminum engine in the autumn of 1915, although I believe that is not correct. Louis had his aluminum engine up and running and testing in early November of 1915 and he was running it in a much different and earlier bodywork than the 1916 Frontenac bodywork. I would guess Louis would have had to have built his aluminum engine no later than the spring/summer of 1915. If I could locate a picture of this alleged Iron engine in earlier bodywork I may be persuaded much easier but I do not understand why they would be testing an engine that did not pan out in 1915 sometime in 1916 or 1917, by Doc Caddy or whatever. As I have said before, I like the books of Borgeson but I do not take everything he says as fact, as history has shown he has jumped to a number of conclusions that were not borne out by the facts. I have not researched the iron engine of Louis enough to go out on any limb and I do not want to be apologizing later on for jumping to conclusions myself. In addition, Planche was very busy with work over at GM and I am not sure how much time he was spending with Louis to say this Iron engine was his on such and such a date. I am not so sure that the so called iron engine may have come after his 1915 aluminum as a study and ended up in one of the 1916/1917 bodies for testing (on a DOHC principle) but that is a guess.

Who designed the valve train? Who knows. As you know this is a virtual minefield of guesswork and anyone that starts to definitively label who gets credit had better have done considerable research and even then they are pretty gutsy.

As to Planche, I believe he was associated with the Walter Automobile, which was the predecessor to the Mercer and possibly the Roebling-Planche creation. I have done a considerable amount of research on Mercer racing and have written an article on the subject, but I am not the expert with all of the answers. That being said I have not run across his name in Mercer racing history. Many give much credit to Finley Porter but I believe Erik Delling was responsible for much of the racing success and was certainly the man behind both SOHC designs that were used by Mercer. I have read nothing of Planche having any involvement.

Planche was a very credible engineer in his own right but everyone deserves their due I suppose. I have nothing to credit him with any valve train designs although that does not mean he did not. The moment I claim that, someone will step out of the shadows to prove me wrong.

When trying to figure out the early OHC designs it often is quite similar to Who's on first?-Jim

 

The Stutz engine designed by Wisconsin in 1916 looks similar to the Frontenac above. Notice the ball bearing crank, single cam, narrow valve angle. Who actually designed this?

Lee,

The top end looks like the 1914 Mercedes and the list of who copied that is almost as long as this thread. I am amazed at how quickly these design were knock off, makes the Chinese today almost look lazy. Now I can understand why Enzo crushED

 

The discussion on Stutz and related engines prompts me to ask a question. A circa 1915 Stutz race car visited New Zealand some years ago for our classic racing events. It bore an external resemblance to the ohc Indy models, one of which is in the Southward Museum, but the engine looked to me to be a T-head type crankcase with an overhead valve conversion. I think the exhaust exited hear the top of the hood, a bit like the Delage if the same era. I can't remember what it was called which is making a google search for it difficult. Does anyone know the car I am talking about?

 

...eh um...WO Bentley...cough...

 

I might be able to answer my own question. I think it might be the car here - http://pricemuseumofspeed.org/pages/?page_id=6

 

One interesting comparison between the Frontenac and Stutz is the diameter of the center main journal. The Fronty is larger, and appears to have longitudinal bolts holding the two halves of the crank together (but why two different diameters??), whereas the Stutz's halves must be connected with a pin with tapers on each end, pulled into tapered holes in the crank cheeks--neither very impressive considering----

Herb Kephart

 

As to who takes credit for the design of the Wisconsin, In 1917 Charles John, the president of Wisconsin gave credit to his chief engineer, "directly after the Indianapolis speedway race of 1914 we agreed to build for Mr Stutz four engines that could compete successfully with foreign made engines. Our engineer, A.F. Milbrath, had sketched out some ideas which met with Mr Stutz's approval and we immediately started to work on the engines."

Jim,

Do you know if four engines were built at Wisconsin ? One each of Delage "Y", Peugeot DOHC, and MB SOHC, leaves one more ? Sounds a little like the Manhattan Project, try everything until you find what works, or was it a variety stage show ?

Paul

 

Delling didn't join Mercer until 1914, so Porter must've been the man behind the raceabout and early racing cars. I haven't heard of any involvement of Planche either, and I'm sure that's just an error based on the Planche-Roebling experiment, and the Walter lineage.

 

I have the name A. F. Milbraith for the Stutz SOHC engine - just a minor spelling difference from Jim's info.

 

I believe the "four engines" quote relates to the four SOHC engines, all of the same type, built for the four 1915 Stutz racing cars.

 

That is not correct he joined Mercer in 1912 as Porter's assistant and left and then returned (see Motor Age 3/19/14 p22). History has given Porter too much credit for his role and Delling not enough. I will dig out a couple of articles later to point this out, one by the company president if I remember correctly.

 

Paul I was under the understanding that the reference to four engines were four copies of the SOHC engines as pictured above by Lee. I also believe this engine owes much of its DNA to the 1914 GP Mercedes. I believe they did produce four complete cars with this SOHC: Wilcox, Anderson, Cooper and sometime later DePalma. These engines were quite successful scoring very impressive wins in 1915 but they were mothballed after the 1915 season (later to be sold and raced again).

The Delage copy of which you refer was pretty much a copy of the winning Delage at Indy (1914). as I understand they built several copies of this engine although they were not very successful on the top racing circuits.

Then they built I believe only one copy of the DOHC (Peugeot copy) that ended up eventually as the Newman Stutz. They may have wanted to build more of this engine but I believe they were treading lightly due to L.C.Erbes lawsuit.

All three of these engines in their original form had done quite well winning at Indy (Peugeot in 1913, Delage in 1914 and Mercedes in 1915) so copying these engines was kind of a no-brainer. The war effort though did stifle any development of the American copies to a large extent I am sure.-Jim

 

These would have likely been somewhere around Rochester, New York..

Curious to know the year and location...

 

Michael, here is an article from Motor Age June 3, 1916, by William T White President of Mercer regarding the very successful Model F. There actually was an article in the May 25, 1916 edition of Motor Age at p.26 wherein they give credit to Delling for his design of the 301 Type F which was piloted by Hughes during 1912...subsequently he left Mercer and this motor was redesigned by Mr Porter for 450ci piston displacement...

In some of the earlier Mercer pieces written, Delling was called a fraud and pretty much all around good for nothing. Apparently the idiot historians never really did their homework, because they felt since he said he attended MIT and they did not find him as a graduate, that he must have been a fraud, plus some other worthless drivel. He attended night classes after moving to the states to study quantity production and took some courses at MIT. In reality he was an accomplished mechanical engineer receiving his degree from the College of Charlotenberg Germany.

I actually am a fan of both he and Porter, although if the Porter devotees were honest, they would have to admit Porter received his education through correspondence courses. That being said, I think what Porter did with this education was amazing, but what he did should not over shadow the accomplishments of Delling either.

How many authors give any credit to Delling for the Type F?-Jim

 

Fascinating stuff

he and Louis filed a patent as co-inventors in Nov 1911.