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Actually, Dave, in my failure, I lost over 1/2 of power producing capacity since I lost all 3 chambers on the Front (No.1) rotor and we know that losing 1/2 of displacement means a loss of more than 1/2 power. No question if you only loose one cylinder AND that failure does not cause further problems then you have only lost approx 1/4 or 1/6 of your power producing elements. So if the failure is a simple Piston ring then you may not even notice it - but if is a blown piston or connecting rod then, of course, you could be talking about the possible disintegration of the a piston engine.
Personally, I'll take 1/2 degradation of the rotor over 1/4 degradation of a piston engine - the main reason is - I am confident the rotary will stay together.
Ed
----- Original Message ----- From: "Dale Rogers" <dale.r@cox.net>
To: "Rotary motors in aircraft" <flyrotary@lancaironline.net>
Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2005 1:45 PM
Subject: [FlyRotary] Re: More Lycoming Problems
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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