The largest cost in an aluminum end housing is the hard wear coating and
subsequent required diamond grinding of the surface. Hopefully Jim will
cut the
$1200 cost for each cast aluminum end housing if he does not have to
do that.
Sealing of the first design open water jacket section to the steel wear
surface was always problematic.
I agree, having seen the three housings cut down the middle -I'm still
scratching my head !!
Richard Sohn seems to have it working short
term.
The new design makes coolant sealing a non issue as the cast aluminum
water
jacket is sealed as it comes out of the mold. In this design the inner
TES O ring does double duty. It seals the coolant from the combustion
chamber
and from the interface between the steel wear surface and the aluminum
surface of the water jacket. No other sealing is required.
I just realised what you were doing , good idea if there is sufficient meat
there to take out without making it weak anywhere!
This designed is best suited to a peripheral port engine. Both
exhaust and intake.
BTW note that the rotor housing locks the steel sheet wear surface
against the aluminum end housing.
So no affixing anywhere ? Maybe locating pins.
I guess this idea did not occur to me prior to the NC mill as it
would be difficult to machine without one :)
BTW I just read in the new Yamaguchi RX8 book that Mazda built an all
aluminum two rotor back in 1987 that weighed 66 pounds less than the
13B.
I think you calculated about 60 lbs !
That would put the bare engine weight at about 124 pounds.
Add the 30 pound weight of a PSRU and we are looking at a 240 HP aircraft
engine of around 155 pounds less accessories.
We have just begun to scratch the amazing potential of the rotary engine
for aircraft use.
Paul
That's about the right weight to get it down to for those who are on a
borderline Cof G, without the need to move wings etc. That would be 155 lbs
PLUS accessories or a bit under 300 lbs all-up. My limit is 300 lbs so
that's nice for me.
Let us know what the housing costs are, I think we would need to produce our
own castings, down the track, if only for the necessary thickness in the
aluminium end housing(wear face) wall -I'm for that!!
George (down under)
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.