The Descriptive Process

[rwoods]

Thanks, I expected more smoke then I saw the title "new" engine. As a boy I lived across the street from a cropduster with a grass strip. He had a sprayer and a duster both Stearmans. Loved to watch him fly and loved the sound. Later in life, I worked for an airfreight company just when deregulation was taking hold. We flew Convair 240s that we had converted to freighters. The whole plane would practically disappear in smoke when you first fired them up. I can't remember what the hourly oil consumption rate was but it was a lot and we had to figure its cost right behind fuel cost. I'm sure the EPA wishes that ever radial was grounded. Ron

 

[paccity]

remember as a kid seeing one of these up in eastern wash, set up for spraying.

 

[Gologit]

remember as a kid seeing one of these up in eastern wash, set up for spraying.

Now that would be a sprayer. Big payload and cover the ground real fast. Might be a heck of a fuel bill though.

 

[rwoods]

You're not kidding. A sprayer with a R2800 would guzzle the fuel. Our Convairs had twin 2800s and drank plenty just at cruise. Ron

 

[madhatte]

Ooh! Ooh! I want in on this!

 

[rwoods]

Nathan, you need an air boat that won't sink under the weight to go with that PW and one that is wide enough not to flip when you blip the throttle. My father was an aviation machinist mate in the Navy during WWII. He said the 2800s in the Hellcats had enough torque that a pilot could flip the plane over if he throttled up too quickly. He also told me that you could practically hang a Hellcat by its prop. Don't know if either is true, but I have no reason to believe otherwise. Ron

 

[paccity]

have herd that you could ground roll them if you gave it the beans to much on take off.

 

[rwoods]

That's what Pop told me. He loved Grummans - thought they were super tough and rugged. Ron

 

[paccity]

there's nothing like the sound of a big radial, at idle or full song. last time i heard one was 9 years ago at reno. accept the b17 that flew over the house last summer. they make noises that an inline just can't make.

 

[Metals406]

Ooh! Ooh! I want in on this!

Put a bar and chain on it!

 

[Gologit]

there's nothing like the sound of a big radial, at idle or full song. last time i heard one was 9 years ago at reno. accept the b17 that flew over the house last summer. they make noises that an inline just can't make.

So right. When they first started hanging turbines on AgCats Gordon Baxter said that they took a perfectly good airplane and made it sound like a snooze alarm. He nailed it.

Nothing, and I mean nothing, sounds like a radial. One of my earliest childhood memories is of my Dad and his two brothers team spraying with 450 Stearmans. They'd go across the field in a tight trailing echelon formation and when all three were in their turns at the same time it was pure poetry in noise and motion.

Later on they got some TBMs and tanked them for use as fire bombers. On a heavy-loaded takeoff that R2600 Wright with the prop in full flat pitch would rattle every window in the hangar.

 

[paccity]

it's a primal sound. that potato,potato idle is why harleys sound that way, basically two cylinders off of a radial.

 

[rwoods]

You guys have good tastes in machines. Ron

 

[madhatte]

My grandmother was a pilot, and I grew up around old airplanes and old pilots. I still look up whenever I hear a radial engine. She used to quiz me on engine sounds. The only one I can still recognize is a Kinner K-5, which means either a Fleet or that one Ryan trainer.

 

[Metals406]

They're showing 12° for a high on Tuesday up here!

Tis that mega storm in AK. Thank god it's short lived!

We gonna be cold!

 

[Metals406]

Kiss my grits Bering Sea!!!

 

[Trx250r180]

Kiss my grits Bering Sea!!!

But it is a dry heat isn't it

 

[rwoods]

Need some material for a new book.

Given RandyMac has three books in the works and having long admired his measured restraint (most recently demonstrated in the New Bore Cut thread), I am thinking of writing a book myself, RandyMac, The Softer Side. Think I'll ask Bob to write the foreword. But I need some more material.

Seriously, I appreciate Randy, Bob and those others of you that continue to contribute despite me and the other numerous boneheads that pipe off when we should keep our traps shut.

Ron

 

[HuskStihl]

it's a primal sound. that potato,potato idle is why harleys sound that way, basically two cylinders off of a radial.

288xp is basically one cylinder off of a radial

 

[northmanlogging]

288xp is basically one cylinder off of a radial

Its one off cylinder alright...