A new radial car AND airplane engine??

Tantalum

Tantalum

Final Approach
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San_Diego_Pilot
Interesting story about these guys.. they initially wanted to build an airplane engine but realized they could test much more easily and cheaply if they make it applicable to cars too

Sort of the inverse of turning a car engine into an airplane engine..

And it's a radial!

.. anyway, flame away!

https://silodrome.com/radial-motion-engine-porsche-356/
 
That's cool and all, but a 3 cylinder radial doesn't have enough cylinders to (in my opinion) have the proper "look" of a radial, and the practicality is minimal. Radials just don't work well for an automotive application - the crankshaft is too high, the weight isn't well distributed, etc. I think their idea of starting off with the engine being auto applicable and also hoping to make it aviation applicable is cool too. As a POC setup, maybe. But I think it misses the mark.
 
Looks like the brakes need a little work on the ZOMBUG...

Radial-Motion-Engine-6-740x544.jpg
 
schmookeeg said:
I learned a lot of my better curse words while balancing a pair of carburetors on my 240Z's straight six. Balancing 3 in radial configuration should provide serious breakthroughs in human vocabulary and invective. :D
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Meh, those 2x Japanese SU-equivalents aren't bad to do. Try putting triple DCOEs on it, then let's talk. :D
 
schmookeeg said:
I learned a lot of my better curse words while balancing a pair of carburetors on my 240Z's straight six. Balancing 3 in radial configuration should provide serious breakthroughs in human vocabulary and invective. :D
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It's injected
 
Ted said:
That's cool and all, but a 3 cylinder radial doesn't have enough cylinders to (in my opinion) have the proper "look" of a radial, and the practicality is minimal. Radials just don't work well for an automotive application - the crankshaft is too high, the weight isn't well distributed, etc. I think their idea of starting off with the engine being auto applicable and also hoping to make it aviation applicable is cool too. As a POC setup, maybe. But I think it misses the mark.
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Not that I disagree in the slightest, but...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/M4_Sherman
 
luvflyin said:
It's injected
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My remarks were in reference to the second option quoted in the article:

Unusually for a radial engine this design uses a common journal crank for all three connecting rods and gear-driven triple camshafts, the two overhead valves per cylinder are operated by pushrods. Both fuel-injected and carburetor-fed versions are available.
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Found this list online of cars with radial engines.
  • The Adams-Farwell rotary car: 1906
  • The North-Lucas car: 1922.
  • The Julian Sport Coupe: 1927.
  • The Rohrbach Concept: 1931>
  • The Stapp Car: 1932.
  • The Meyers Car: 1932 NEW.
  • The Trossi-Monaco Racing car: 1934.
There are reasons cars don’t normally have radials, but some of these look really cool.
 
bflynn said:
Found this list online of cars with radial engines.
  • The Adams-Farwell rotary car: 1906
  • The North-Lucas car: 1922.
  • The Julian Sport Coupe: 1927.
  • The Rohrbach Concept: 1931>
  • The Stapp Car: 1932.
  • The Meyers Car: 1932 NEW.
  • The Trossi-Monaco Racing car: 1934.
There are reasons cars don’t normally have radials, but some of these look really cool.
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I think the driving factor behind these cars is more a case of 'we have a bunch of surplus radial engines sitting around' than 'this really works well for this application.' That certainly was the case with the previously cited M4 Sherman tank.
 
What I found interesting is that a lot of these cars put the engine horizontal and that lowered the COG rather than raised it. Very clever and assuming you could still cool it and get the power out of it, it would make a very nice handling car.
 
I have quite a bit of flight time behind a two cylinder engine in a homebuilt Luton Minor, The engine was an
Aeronca JAP. Low and slow!
 
bflynn said:
What I found interesting is that a lot of these cars put the engine horizontal and that lowered the COG rather than raised it. Very clever and assuming you could still cool it and get the power out of it, it would make a very nice handling car.
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And if you retrofit it with a boxer engine, you would have an even nicer handling car.
 
bflynn said:
Found this list online of cars with radial engines.
Click to expand...
The Internet isn't very kind to some of these.
  • The Adams-Farwell rotary car: 1906
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This is technically a (Sopwith Camel style, not Wankel) rotary rather than a radial.
  • The Rohrbach Concept: 1931>
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Seems to be vaporware.
  • The Stapp Car: 1932.
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"one of the most outlandish, and ugliest, cars to ever attempt to do so."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/René_Stapp
  • The Meyers Car: 1932 NEW.
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"This car was not so much a practical proposition as a perpetual-motion fraud."
http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/TRANSPORT/comprair/comprair.htm#meyers
  • The Trossi-Monaco Racing car: 1934.
Click to expand...
"The car was a spectacular failure and never raced in a Grand Prix event."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Felice_Trossi

bflynn said:
What I found interesting is that a lot of these cars put the engine horizontal and that lowered the COG rather than raised it.
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Not really. There's the problem of getting the power from a vertical crankshaft to the wheels. You end up having to raise the engine (and hence the CG) to accommodate the transmission, such as here:
North-Lucas.jpg
 
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