John- Just for you. 198/17 just after delivery to Jasta 14 in January 1918. Image Unavailable, Please Login
How to kill a Spitfire Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
You may have seen this but I'll post it anyway. The German's captured an intact MkVB transplanted a DB605 engine for testing. It was a very good combination. It was very popular with the German testing staff. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Nope hadn't seen that, very interesting! That happened a bit on all sides with captured equipment. A few interesting photos around of tanks and such wearing the opponents markings.
The Merlin was a wonderful engine but Rolls Royce couldn't build a pool cue without getting the tolerances all wrong and end up requiring hand fitting. When Packard (?) started making them in America they redid all the drawings with proper tolerances and the end result produced more power and they were obviously able to build them quicker. When I did my mechanical engineering certificate I was taught by a bunch of old POM's and their whole attitude was that everything has to be hand fitted ... unbelievable. Used to go on and on about files and how to use them. One student finally spat the dummy in one lesson and asked why the heck were we being taught all this old fashioned cr@p that nobody uses any more. Things are machined to designed tolerances and if necessary selected in like groups. English engineering is great but their accuracy and understanding of the fact that things cannot be made spot on and tolerances are required is just not there ... back then anyway. And let's not get into their cars ... over engineered rubbish with an end result that is worse to drive than a Ford Escort, requiring thousands of special tools. Pete
I very much am, but Colin was a brilliant ideas man and the complete opposite of how I view Rolls Royce. I'm also sure many Lotus car owners would agree that the implementation of the idea was not perfect ... BTW I am a big fan of some English cars (early Ford Escort, Jaguars, Jensen, even some Triumphs) and respect their F1 efforts. If I was ever to purchase an English car and had the time and funds, the best thing that you could do to the car is pull all the mechanicals apart, remachine and balance correctly and reassemble and you would have a considerably better car. I remember my father (who was an unofficial Triumph specialist) rebuilding a customers Triumph 2500 PI once and had the crank and flywheel, etc. balanced and the car was like a BMW for smoothness afterwards ... just wonderful. My issue with Rolls Royce and some English engineering is this making things fit after it has been made attitude. That is simply wrong. When the item is designed, it should be designed with proper tolerances so that it simply will just fit!. Europeans, Americans and Japanese do this and do it well. When working on an English car you learn that every bolt has to be left loose until every one has been started ... only then can you start tightening them up. While this is good practice it is required because the manufacture of the parts are so poor in quality. I remember reading about how early Rolls Royce's would be constantly updated as Royce would wander around the factory and change things all the time ... nuts. He also made a comment that a straight cut gear if assembled correctly should be as quiet as a helical gear, but if quietness is what they were after then at the design stage a helical gear should have been specified! Just stupid engineering, not good engineering. BTW: I've driven a Silver Shadow because my father used to maintain it for a customer and I will admit it surprised me with it's straight line performance but even thinking about corners would cause unbelievable understeer and body roll. My father fixed a rear wheel bearing I think and had to borrow a special tool as the hub nut was done up to a million foot pounds ... totally stupid and unnecessary. It is just a hub nut, not holding the earth together. Pete ps: Of course the Silver Ghost was a wonderful example of understanding metalogy and still the best Rolls Royce IMO
Talkin' about Triumph's ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I own a fairly rare 1965 Triumph 2000 MD.....if you know what I'm talkin' about. It is for sale........now!
Amazing how we can always lean something. I've never heard of the Managing Director edition before but otherwise very familiar with the Triumph 2000. Would be a rare car now. Pete
No you wouldn't, you'd still have a POS, with inadequate cooling, underengineered drivetrain and mindless cost-cutting everywhere. Triumph 2000's weren't particularly powerful, but still blew up their gearboxes regularly, unless you drove them like a grandfather, which is what most people learned to do. But to prove they could build something even worse, out came the Stag. A heaving piece of engineering excrement, built by rabid communists and bought by deluded virgins. (Greg, are you there?)
I have to agree on the cost cutting everywhere. The only English car that I've worked on that did not appear to suffer from that was the Rover 2000 TC that I rebuilt the engine on. Wonderful engine with the only gasket being the head gasket. Everything else was sealed with o-rings. I still like Triumphs and they can be made into nice cars ... but yes the gearbox and clutch were an embarrassment. Pete
