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Ed Anderson <eanderson@carolina.rr.com> wrote:
I agree, Dave.
Even after I lost the apex seals and rotor on way to Sun & Fun in April and flew back on one rotor, I knew that few reciprocating engines would have done nearly as well on only 1/2 their cylinders. Just further confirmed my opinion that the rotary - like all things mechanical - can break but does so with the most graceful degradation of performance
Ed.
Just playing devil's advocate here. A lot of the recent failures noted on the two canard lists involve only a single cylinder. So they are only losing 1/4 or 1/6 their power output. OTOH, on the rotary, every *engine* failure mode I can think of will cost the flyer a minimum of two faces - 1/3 the engine's capacity. WRT Dave's failure ... how much of an effect would a broken piston ring yield? Usually, no the whole 25% which that cylinder is worth on a Lycosaurus 4 banger.
Nevertheless, Dave's total engine rebuild is going to cost far less than the cost of repairing the damage from a single broken ring on a Lyc.
Dale R.
COZY MkIV #1254 R13B still mid-build
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