Odd and even numbers of cylinders

Ira:
Is that the Polska-Wotakarski with the
5-speed Kielbasa transmission and the body designed by the Italian team of
Linguini & Pepperoni?

[Vin]

In WW 11, the U S went radial, Corsair, Hellcat, P 47, the B’s 17, 24 etc whilst the British went in line Spitfire, Hurricane, Lancaster. Anyone know why the different approaches ?


Vin

I think that the radial was able to take more battle damage than an in-line The in-lines were for better streamlining and visibility but were prone to losing all their coolant an seizing up when
damaged. As captain Frank hawks once said, "Flying a radial-engined plane was like running against the wind with your
overcoat unbuttoned."

[Ira_Silverman]

Leo:

You might try a search for this book, issued as part of the “Smithsonian Annals of Flight” series:

Dickey, Philip S. THE LIBERTY ENGINE 1918-1942. Washington, Smithsonian, 1968. 110 pp., illus., pict. cover, wraps.

It has nice coverage of the developed engines as well as prototype studies.

VBR,

Ira

Rotaries and radials are four-stroke (ignition, evacuation, aspiration, compression)engines and need two full travels of the piston through each cylinder. If you have a seven cylinder engine you can maintain a consistent power level by timing the cylinders to fire in the following repetitive sequence:1,3,5,7,2,4,6 which requires two revolutions of the crankshaft. In other words, while one cylinder is firing its two neighbors are drawing in air and fuel. Radials and rotaries with an even number of cylinders per bank existed but were not "smooth" because of the necessary syncopation in the ignition. See Bill Gunston's book on aero engines for a great description of this problem.