Official Aviation Thread...

[cale]

De havilland Buffalo's, not caribou's!

[george graves]

Can anyone explain to me how they use to start up these old, huge radial engines?



I was always curious since I watched that great old movie "The Flight of the Phoenix" - the 1965 version, where they use shot gun shells to start the engine. How did that work?

Anyways in the video of this engine, it almost sounds like there is a vacuum being pulled on the exhaust side to start up the motor. Or maybe it's a electric motor on a flywheel?

Any insight?

[mrsleeve]

Pony motor. Or externally powered huge electric starter motors. that spin up a fly wheeI and then engage a clutching mechanism. irc anyway

[BlackbirdM3]

Can anyone explain to me how they use to start up these old, huge radial engines?



I was always curious since I watched that great old movie "The Flight of the Phoenix" - the 1965 version, where they use shot gun shells to start the engine. How did that work?

Anyways in the video of this engine, it almost sounds like there is a vacuum being pulled on the exhaust side to start up the motor. Or maybe it's a electric motor on a flywheel?

Any insight?

There were several different methods, one was a hand cranked inertia starter. Another was the Coffman starter that used a shell with cordite in it, and the 3rd was a normal electric starter. Often the electric starters required the use of an auxiliary engine/generator to provide the power to crank the engine or engines because the batteries wouldn't last that long.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffman_engine_starter

Wil

[gkurey]

Yours truly getting to trap on the French Carrier, Charles De Gaulle....very awesome experience.

[E-Thirty]

Huh, didn't know the French had a carrier with catapults. What was the logistics like from your end?

[FLYNAVY]

Yours truly getting to trap on the French Carrier, Charles De Gaulle....very awesome experience.

I fucking hate flying off the boat.....or being there at all......so thanks for the reminder :)

That thing looks ridiculously tiny crossing the ramp.....like 27C Korea/Vietnam boat tiny. How much error did you guys with your U-2 wings have either side of centerline?

[gkurey]

I fucking hate flying off the boat.....or being there at all......so thanks for the reminder :)

That thing looks ridiculously tiny crossing the ramp.....like 27C Korea/Vietnam boat tiny. How much error did you guys with your U-2 wings have either side of centerline?

Haha, glad to bring you back to the sweet life any time! It is tiny...our ship seemed massive when we went back to it. The french dudes have one hawkeye so the COD fits fine, its just tight outside of the LA.

E-thirty, all of our gear plays with theirs because they utilize all the same stuff as US carriers for the most part.

[FLYNAVY]

Haha, glad to bring you back to the sweet life any time! It is tiny...our ship seemed massive when we went back to it. The french dudes have one hawkeye so the COD fits fine, its just tight outside of the LA.

E-thirty, all of our gear plays with theirs because they utilize all the same stuff as US carriers for the most part.

Yeah that makes sense. Pretty cool you got to do that. We were pretty close to the Kuznetsov, but for some reason they didn't let us cross deck onto their boat :)

[mrsleeve]

I didnt know the french were even fielding a flat top, I thought it was only us the brits, the rooskies and the Chinese with the old Russian thing they bought that not even the Russians would use anymore, and the indian thing they bought from the russinas as well

Anyway gkurey's video linked in a news story here

http://www.businessinsider.com/video-shows-us-aircraft-landing-on-a-french-aircraft-carrier-amid-isis-fight-2015-3

Anyway very cool insider perspective

[FLYNAVY]

I didnt know the french were even fielding a flat top, I thought it was only us the brits, the rooskies and the Chinese with the old Russian thing they bought that not even the Russians would use anymore, and the indian thing they bought from the russinas as well

Anyway gkurey's video linked in a news story here

http://www.businessinsider.com/video-shows-us-aircraft-landing-on-a-french-aircraft-carrier-amid-isis-fight-2015-3

Anyway very cool insider perspective

Actually, the Brits left the game a while back (1980's I believe), and are trying to get back into it. AFAIK, the carrier capable forces are France, Russia, Brazil, China (questionable on that one at the moment), India, and the US. Only US, France and Brazil operate conventional catapult configured boats at the moment.

[gkurey]

I didnt know the french were even fielding a flat top, I thought it was only us the brits, the rooskies and the Chinese with the old Russian thing they bought that not even the Russians would use anymore, and the indian thing they bought from the russinas as well

Anyway gkurey's video linked in a news story here

http://www.businessinsider.com/video-shows-us-aircraft-landing-on-a-french-aircraft-carrier-amid-isis-fight-2015-3

Anyway very cool insider perspective

Thanks for the link! Didn't realize it spread around so quickly!

[hoveringuy]

Nice! That looks way clearer than I remember.

[red baron]

I was curious if anyone was planning on going to OshKosh this summer. Pretty sure I will be camping under the wing for most of the week.

[Northern]

These guys are trying to do something that could benefit everyone, but they have a very steep hill to climb to get there. They are trying to crowd source the funds to buy a small fleet of Lockheed P3 Orion air tankers for fighting fires. The guys are all former employees of the company that used to own them. That said, since forest fires can affect everyone, its worth everyones effort to toss them a buck or two in an effort to make it happen. They have a good plan, they just need everyone's help to make it happen. Get your friends, and their friends in on it. It could be your house they are covering with fire retardant.


Here is a podcast of what they are trying to do, and how they propose to do it.

http://thehangardeck.com/episode-14-save-firefighting-p-3-orions/

Their website.

http://www.orionaff.com/

I just donated $20, who else is in? Lets get these back in the air.

Will

Back when I started working my current job, AeroUnion had just gone under. We did heavy maintenance/serious structural work on these P-3's for as cheap as we could make it (at their request). When they went, the left one of these P-3's in one of our hangars, and I saw it first hand. I've never seen a wing that was more patch than original wing, just loaded up with massive doublers full of Hucks and HiLoks. That old thing sat there for a couple years before somebody decided to scrap it a few months back.