OT model radial engine

This caught my eye at The Turkey Run in Daytona. I know a lot of you guys like old airplanes like me. There is nothing like a radial engine for looks to me. While I was looking at it he started the rascal up and let it run. It's all hand made from blueprints in an old model magazine. Needless to say he's a retired machinist.

I was just mesmerized with the exposed rockers rocking and the push rods pushing. It really is a sight to see. He had other engines too but this one did it for me. I am in awe.

 

real airplanes have round engines...... nice!

 

Tommy, do a little searching on YouTube.

They have several of these being fired up as well as some full scale round motors getting fired up.


Fwiw, firing up a round motor on an airliner etc. is more of a technological achievement than is lighting off a kerosene burner (jet.)

 

worked on C-124 cargo planes with 4 radial engines back in the 60's. Each one was a 4360 cubic in 28 cylinder monster.....only had 4 throws on the crank.....4 rows, 7 banks, 56 spark plugs with a one barrel carb ...about the size of a small fridge. They did kick ***!!!

 

I saw it there too Tommy. I was fascinated with it. He fired it up and also brought out some spare parts such as a valve and valve spring while I was there. It's running in this pic.

Edit: I just noticed that the engine stands are different. Now I'm not sure if we saw the same fella. The engine sure looks the same though.

 

Tommy, if you want to see a small radial go to minimodelengines.com George Luhr makes some incredible stuff and they all run on gasoline. You should get to Cabinfever in Jan. at the York Fairgrounds.

 

Need about 7 fingers on one hand to start a radial. Like above, cool vids out there of these.

 

Very cool, I picked up a book that described how to build a scale model of a 9 cylinder radial. It didn't take too much reading to realize the skill level for building it was beyond my current abilities.

Ron