Cheapest way to acquire turbine engine?

ArrowFlyer86

ArrowFlyer86

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Not a turbine aircraft, just the engine. Functioning or not (I don't plan to fire it up). Smaller is better. But something for GA-ish aircraft. Not looking for a massive Avon or GE90...

My intention is to also acquire all the manual(s) for it, take it apart, see how everything fits, airflow, fuel lines, blade shape, combustion liner, etc... and maybe/maybe not put it back together. It's just for the edification of seeing how the pieces fit IRL.

Reason: a couple months ago I nerded out hard and went down the rabbit hole on turbines. It may have had something to do with the RTX booth at Oshkosh walking me and my younger cousin through how they work for nearly an hour (with their open body PT6s on display). Since then I've put a big dent in a couple text books on them but I want to see IRL how things fit together. I'm at the point where I'd get a lot of enjoyment being able to look at real parts.

I'm OK to carve out a decent budget on this as a learning experience.

Any ideas where I could look to find them? Occasionally I'll see some on barnstormers but that's about it. Aircraft salvage services? Junk yard equivalents? All suggestions welcome.
 
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ArrowFlyer86 said:
Any ideas where I could look to find them?
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What type of turbine engine? Jet? Turboprop? Turboshaft?
How much you want to spend?
Finding manuals will be very specific to which model you select.
If you want to see how they work, etc. better option is youtube videos.
Some engines are not easy to simply disassemble without specialized tooling and fixtures even on your garage workbench.
 
Bell206 said:
What type of turbine engine? Jet? Turboprop? Turboshaft?
How much you want to spend?
Finding manuals will be very specific to which model you select.
If you want to see how they work, etc. better option is youtube videos.
Some engines are not easy to simply disassemble without specialized tooling and fixtures even on your garage workbench.
Click to expand...
Great question.
Any turbine would be good.
Turboprop preferred. A very light jet/small biz jet turbofan would also work.

I've already been a subscriber on YouTube (in fact I'm a patreon subscriber for almost a year or the top turbine guy). The problem is I'm really, really bad when it comes to spatial skills. I need to pretty much see it first hand to see how it all fits together. If I were to go with YT I'd need custom videos to show me the things I don't know.

It's kind of a case of "a picture is worth a thousand words", except in this case "seeing IRL is worth 10000 text books".
 
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Also, random invite... But if anybody with more wrenching experience than me (meaning pretty much anybody that's decent with tools) wants to disassemble a turbine with a newbie, PM me. I'd be happy to fly somewhere and join forces for a small project like this.
 
ArrowFlyer86 said:
Also, random invite... But if anybody with more wrenching experience than me (meaning pretty much anybody that's decent with tools) wants to disassemble a turbine with a newbie, PM me. I'd be happy to fly somewhere and join forces for a small project like this.
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Count me in if you're basing it at your hangar! My mobile toolkit is mediocre - but I do know where my 10mm socket is!
 
The Solar T62 series was my first thought… but that Fouga engine looks perfect for this sort of project.

Would also be fun to crank it up and watch it go. Not sure how feasible that is without instruments… prolly get some documents from the guy selling it.

Keep us up to date, sounds epic! Welcome to come here and do that. Got some tools and shop space, little warmer here in Mississippi than Chicago.
 
Tools said:
The Solar T62 series was my first thought… but that Fouga engine looks perfect for this sort of project.

Would also be fun to crank it up and watch it go. Not sure how feasible that is without instruments… prolly get some documents from the guy selling it.

Keep us up to date, sounds epic! Welcome to come here and do that. Got some tools and shop space, little warmer here in Mississippi than Chicago.
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I will certainly keep you posted! And the invite is appreciated. I mean your name is "TOOLS"; on those grounds you seem qualified to operate machinery (I've also seen your threads for a couple years!)
 
Seems like there ought to be an airplane scrapyard somewhere that'd sell you one for scrap value. If you find one, good chance it'll fit in the back of the Lance...
 
455 Bravo Uniform said:
I think you’d be doing yourself a big disservice if you didn’t a̵l̵s̵o̵ ̵p̵l̵a̵n̵ ̵t̵o̵ ̵b̵u̵i̵l̵d̵ ̵a̵ ̵s̵t̵a̵n̵d̵ ̵a̵n̵d̵ ̵t̵e̵s̵t̵ ̵r̵u̵n̵ ̵i̵t̵ ̵o̵n̵ ̵t̵h̵e̵ ̵g̵r̵o̵u̵n̵d̵.̵ ̵ ̵I̵f̵ ̵y̵o̵u̵’̵r̵e̵ ̵g̵o̵i̵n̵g̵ ̵t̵h̵i̵s̵ ̵f̵a̵r̵ get one with an afterburner…
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FIFY.
 
Bell206 said:
No, even for disassembly in some cases unless you plan to use a Sawzall to take it apart.;)
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Sawzall, hammer, drill. I feel confident I can disassemble it... In fact, I have all three of those already... :-)
 
172andyou said:
Sawzall, hammer, drill. I feel confident I can disassemble it... In fact, I have all three of those already...
Click to expand...
Ha. In that case, a torch or plasma cutter is much faster. Its been known to use both when scavenging certain internal turbine parts when the engine is too messed up to disassemble or time is of the essence.
 
Bell206 said:
Ha. In that case, a torch or plasma cutter is much faster. Its been known to use both when scavenging certain internal turbine parts when the engine is too messed up to disassemble or time is of the essence.
Click to expand...
I don't have a plasma cutter, but perhaps this is the excuse I've been looking for!
 
ArrowFlyer86 said:
Not a turbine aircraft, just the engine. Functioning or not (I don't plan to fire it up). Smaller is better. But something for GA-ish aircraft. Not looking for a massive Avon or GE90...

My intention is to also acquire all the manual(s) for it, take it apart, see how everything fits, airflow, fuel lines, blade shape, combustion liner, etc... and maybe/maybe not put it back together. It's just for the edification of seeing how the pieces fit IRL.

Reason: a couple months ago I nerded out hard and went down the rabbit hole on turbines. It may have had something to do with the RTX booth at Oshkosh walking me and my younger cousin through how they work for nearly an hour (with their open body PT6s on display). Since then I've put a big dent in a couple text books on them but I want to see IRL how things fit together. I'm at the point where I'd get a lot of enjoyment being able to look at real parts.

I'm OK to carve out a decent budget on this as a learning experience.

Any ideas where I could look to find them? Occasionally I'll see some on barnstormers but that's about it. Aircraft salvage services? Junk yard equivalents? All suggestions welcome.
Click to expand...
Is there a community college with an aircraft maintenance technician certificate program nearby? When I was working on my A&P certificates, the school had several turbine engines we took apart and put back together along with a working engine on a test stand that we could run and troubleshoot. You could enroll and just take the courses that interested you if you didn't want to go for the certificates.
 
Not to be a smart a**, but sounds to me like you need a wrecked helicopter. No idea where to find those, though, at least in this country.

Maybe aircraft museums would have a source? Or maybe one has an aircraft they're going to display but without the engine.

edit - try searching for "surplus wrecked aircraft for sale". way more hits than I expected.
 
we have a J85 variant (T-38 engine) cutaway all labeled in the lobby of the sim building. Any decent AMT collegiate program should have similar mockups for your edification.
 
If it were me, I would try to find a used hobby turboprop meant for RC airplanes. It should be fairly simple and easy to disassemble and reassemble for demo purposes. And it actually runs.
 
Thank you for all the suggestions so far :)
I'm going to keep scouring the web for an old turbine. If no candidates in the price range pop up in the next month or so, I'll get one of those kits.
 
+1 vote on the magister engine. Flew in one a number of years ago. One of the loudest jet engines I’ve ever heard. Would be cool to see follow ups on it.
 
Update: Still looking for one... Scouring TAP, Barnstormers, controller and eBay often...
 
Govdeals.com has former A&P school engines from time to time. Sometimes they go pretty cheap.

There is also small turbine GPUs and huff carts to play with.
 
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