I am aware of Richards amazing work, I just don't lump him into the category
of homebuilder. It just seems to me that every once in a while some one
throws an idea out here and after a bit of discussion it is decided that
things aren't as simple as they seem and that Mazda with their millions of
dollars over the years should just be copied.

What I'm seeing in this thread
is a lot of what ifs. With all respect to Richard his system is still not
proven although I think it shows great promise. Even if all goes well it
will be several years before we see how reliable it is. How many unproven
plates could he sell in that time.

It is one thing to build one or two and
use them yourself, but is manufacturing them a realistic outcome ? RB on the
other hand has what appears to be a copy of the proven Mazda plate but
aluminum instead of iron. But according to the post here they are unproven
and the coating are a bit of an unknown. But isn't this a better point to
start from ?

I have seen a few Rotax 912 go to triple TBO in hard training
service and at that point the wear in the al. cylinders was minimal to the
point of being very difficult to measure. I believe one of these cores,
which could no longer be used in a certified a/c, is still in service in a
homebuilt. Surely the service to be seen in rotary duty couldn't be any
worse.

Wouldn't we be further ahead putting some RB plates into service and
doing oils analysis every 25 or 50 hours and poking a boroscope into a
p-port hole at the same time. What would be an acceptable TBO for these ?
Would RB be willing to sell some uncoated plates so they could be det gun
coated and tested. Imagine an al. three rotor at Reno, that would promote
the rotary and plate sales. I sure don't want to sound like a naysayer but
it seems like RB is halfway there and they could sell 10 times as many to
ground pounding rotor heads.

John Gibbons

John,
As Richard knows the biggest problem for the two piece housing is sealing,
if he has that licked, all will be well. For myself I couldn't see easy
solutions due to the fact many of the partitions have limited room for
sealing two pieces together and maintaining good separation of the
oil/water.
Mazda may have stuck with the cast iron housing but has kept the weight to a
minimum due to full use of all available space. I have never seen so many
voids, channels and passage ways utilizing most of the available space.It's
like a bloody honeycomb in there!

He may be a back-yarder but he has put quite considerable amount of time and
money in the project. Just to commit to the casting of the iron plate is
considerable financial commitment IMHO.

Full acknowledgement of his efforts, from this quarter!
George ( down under)



The Rotary Engine NewsLetter. Powered by Linux.
ACRE NL web site. http://www.rotaryeng.net
Copyright 1998-2006 All world wide rights reserved.