pining,twin plugging,etc...

Dave Williams dave.williams at chaos.lrk.ar.us
Mon Mar 16 15:44:06 GMT 1998


-> was hardly unreliable. In the end, they were able to get 1 HP for 2
-> lbs engine weight, not enough to compete with the 1 lb/ HP of gas
-> engines with 100/130 fuel.

 Several of the German bombers used the aerodiesels anyway.  Though
power was down from a comparable gas engine (though Napier later showed
the diesels could be competitive) the Diesel bombers had a number of
advantages.  The supply of Diesel was more stable than that of high
octane avgas, which meant the bombers were flyable when conventional
planes were grounded from lack of fuel; Diesel fuel has a lower specific
gravity, which meant either more fuel or more payload could be carried,
and Diesel was less flammable than avgas, a nice thing when people are
shooting at you.

 The advent of the turboprop and jet engines pretty well short circuited
all aero piston engine development, but if it hadn't been for that,
Diesels would probably have taken over for everything except fighter
craft as designers learned how to bump the power/weight ratio more
favorably.
                                 



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