Paul wrote:
It happened twice so far that I know about. Different results. It just
hit me why the engine accelerates so fast. It is because the stock auto
transmission engine has a heavy torque converted bolted to the
flex plate while we are running with flex plate only.

Many years ago I put a Mazda in a Lola T240 that I had carved up and made into the second IMSA Camel Lite car.
(Closed top gull wing doors, Hewland FT200). The flywheel was the auto trans flex plate with a button flywheel on top of that and a Tilton 7 1/4" single disc clutch. One of the drivers missed 3rd gear a number of times and it became obvious that 3rd was nowhere to be found. Third was being selected at the end of 2nd gear at about 9500 RPM. Releasing the clutch without selecting a gear to load the engine, and the throttle wide open eventually paid off. The car coasted into the pit still running normally. The driver reported that it ran OK but wouldn't pull anymore. (no clutch). On in spection it was found that the aluminum spacer ring between the clutch cover and the button flywheel was missing. It had failed through the six bolt holes and all six pieces had escaped from the bell housing. The starter gear was missing from the flexplate. Pieces of it were too long to escape from the bell housing and were still in there making one hell of a racket. The bell housing was cut thro!

ugh in several places. The Smiths mechanical tach stopped at 10,000 RPM at the 2:00 position. The tattle tail was at the 4:00 position. Back home the only engine damage was that it 
shined up the main bearings a bit. Everything else was fine. Then I bought a rev limiter.

Lynn E. Hanover

The AirCraft Rotary Engine NewsLetter.              Powered by Linux.

http://home.earthlink.net/~rotaryeng/            http://www.linux.org