How hard does the steel plate have to be hardened to achieve the

same

wear

characteristics as the stock housings, and Racing Beats aluminum

housings?

Royce

My guess is around Rockwell C60. I don't know what RB uses for

coatings.

I don't think it will ever be as hard as tungsten carbide but then
there is no possibility of it flaking off either.

Paul Lamar

Paul,
Great !! but I'm a little confused.
Do you intend to use a carbon type steel  and heat treat it through to
Rockwell C 60 or a mild steel with a surface treatment.
George (down under).

Carbon chrome molly steel. 4130 or 4340. Heat treated.

Paul Lamar

We have cut about 6 engines into iddy biddy pieces to see how it is made,

how it

works, and how it can be hot rodded.
In doing all this we decided to abandon the idea of mixing two different

metals

for several reasons.
We now know how to mill two aluminum plates that get bolted together to

form

each housing.
No wear plate needed, and no problems of seperation or flaking.
Anyone with a "cc" mill and aluminum drops can make their own end

housings.

It's a simple process.
Royce

--Dan Ruggirello wrote:

Royce,
Can you provide more details, or is the process/design proprietary?  What
are your reasons not to use dissimilar metals - coefficient of thermal
expansion differences?

Dan

Dan, we carried all the pieces and patterns to sun n fun.
A few people looked at them throughly, and seemed to understand what it was all
about. Others just looked over the table and made no comment.
The process is very simple. It is not proprietary. It is being done to develope a
single rotor version that can be used in an ultralight and the sport plane class.
The principles apply to any number of rotors tho.
Research shows that no dissimilar metals are needed. The housings can be easily
made from aluminum plate that is already heat treated. It is already in a simi
finished form.
Using dissimilar metals is an added complication that makes the housings
neccessary to be made by a foundry, or high class machine shop of some type.
By using the proper metals and processes it is possible to make the end housings
from plate stock and the average machinest can machine and lap the plates without
any problems.  A lot of people on this list can easily make their own end housings
from aluminum.
We were rather surprised that so few people even showed up to look at the
patterns. Must not have been very many people there interested in a light weight
rotary engine.
Royce

Lets cut to the chase here Royce. I think what people want to know is: 
Are you using the bare aluminum as the wear surface?

Paul Lamar
 
The AirCraft Rotary Engine NewsLetter.  Powered by Linux.
ACRE NL web site. http://home.earthlink.net/~rotaryeng/            
Copyright 1998-2003 All world wide rights reserved.