flyrotary@lancaironline.net Mailing List Archive

What with rising energy costs, I've been kicking around an idea for creating a solar-thermal generator system. If you're not familiar with the solar-thermal idea, it uses solar energy concentrated through a reflector to heat a pipe containing either oil or water in order to make steam. You could use the waste heat to actually heat your house too (co-generation). In looking for something on the order of a micro-turbine, it occurred to me that since the rotary acts like a turbine, couldn't you plumb it to run on steam? I was thinking that maybe if you position the ports correctly, you might be able to power two sides of a rotor at once: Side A would be feeding steam in through the normal intake port, then exhaust out through a p-port somewhere around the leading sparkplug location; Side B would be feeding steam in through a new port somewhere around the trailing sparkplug and exhausting out the normal exhaust port. I'm pretty sure this would work for one side, but I'm not so sure about two sides at once. I have a '91 turbo 13B that I'm intending to go into a BD4 someday, but have not gotten around to tearing it down, so I'm not intimately familiar with Wankel timing yet. What do those of you who have a lot more experience with the engine think of the idea? Grant Schemmel Penrose, CO -----Original Message----- From: Rotary motors in aircraft [mailto:flyrotary@lancaironline.net] On Behalf Of Ed Anderson Sent: Friday, June 06, 2008 8:06 AM To: Rotary motors in aircraft Subject: [FlyRotary] Titanium rotary? [FlyRotary] Re: Big engines Always interesting to hear of excursions from the stock 2 rotor format. Does anyone recall the gent who was going to make a rotary engine out of titanium? As best I recall I believe he actually had a rotor tact welded reportedly out of titanium plate - there were some photos. I doubted at the time that anything would come of it, but it was interesting to see what some folks are willing to tackle. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ernest Christley" <echristley@nc.rr.com> To: "Rotary motors in aircraft" <flyrotary@lancaironline.net> Sent: Friday, June 06, 2008 9:59 AM Subject: [FlyRotary] Re: Big engines > Lynn Hanover wrote: >> In this case you could machine away one face or both faces and braze two >> rotors together. One end with the gear and the other without. You could >> have >> twice the bearing length, and nearly twice the displacement. >> >> Just the crank, rotors and housings would be special. Everything else >> could >> be stock pieces. Maybe double the torque, could be direct drive? >> > Those voices keep talking to me. > > Could you use two rotor housings, brazed then pinned on the compression > side? Then they wouldn't really need to be special either, and you'd get > FOUR plugs per cylinder. > > Side seals would be standard, but would the apex seals have to be special > made...or could you use two of those side-by-side? > > You would have to have either a monster bridge port or a peripheral port > to feed the monster. > > Renesis rotor housings probably wouldn't work. The side exhaust would be > to restrictive for twice the volume. > > You'd need to build a new oil pan, or use a remote sump. Simple. Special > made compression bolts are also a cinch. > > On a guess, you'd be adding about 15lbs per rotor (?). It could possibly > end up being a 400Hp engine with an installed weight under 350lbs(?). > > -- > Homepage: http://www.flyrotary.com/ > Archive and UnSub: > http://mail.lancaironline.net:81/lists/flyrotary/List.html -- Homepage: http://www.flyrotary.com/ Archive and UnSub: http://mail.lancaironline.net:81/lists/flyrotary/List.html Notice: This e-mail is intended solely for use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is proprietary, privileged, company confidential and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If the reader is not the intended recipient or agent responsible for delivering the message to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If this communication has been transmitted from a U.S. location it may also contain data subject to the International Traffic in Arms Regulations or U.S. Export Administration Regulations and cannot be disseminated, distributed or copied to foreign nationals, residing in the U.S. or abroad, without the prior approval of the U.S. Department of State or appropriate export licensing authority. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender by reply e-mail or collect telephone call and delete or destroy all copies of this e-mail message, any physical copies made of this e-mail message and/or any file attachment(s).