round motor question

I think it might vibrate quite a bit. The typical firing order in a 7 cyl radial is 1 3 5 7 2 4 6, so yours would be 1 _ _ 7 2 _ _ ; with each cylinder being about 96 cid.

I think your hp/weight of the engine would cancel many of the advantages (huge torque) that you're looking for.

Reminds me of all of the airplane engined Brit cars, especially the V-12 Merlin rods - they had a penchant for those.

 

Reminds me of this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TIdQFnUvCA

 

Sheer genius. Mad, yes, but genius.

 

LOL When a chevy big block just isn't enough

 

Sorry - it seemed small.
The firing order is typically 1 3 5 7 9 2 4 6 8,
so you are talking about 1 - - - 9 2 - - -

Depending on condition and dash number, that engine might be worth some $

 

I am impressed. Lots of different ways but still impressed. Must be one noisy ride in there though.

 

I think it could run but it would need a big flywheel and it would be a tall motor putting the CG pretty high hurting the handling.

 

Plenty warm in there as well.

 

I'd rather buy your engine and put it on a Stearman where it belongs than to see it destroyed doing something like that with it. It weighs too much for what you want to do anyway even if it would run at all, which it would not. What dash number is it?

May I suggest going to an auto auction site or ebay and get a R1200GS BMW motorcycle engine? It's horizontally opposed and will climb if geared right.

 

It hurts me to think of a beautiful R680 being chopped up to be used as a silly unique engine in a vehicle for which it was never intended and would not perform well. Sell the engine to someone who can use it for that which it was intended and retain it as a very nice aircraft engine. It seems to fall into the same category as the Model A and B autos that are chopped, channeled, and clipped into the California hot rods and thus destroyed. . There is an intrinsic value to some things that must be valued and kept. Why mutilate something just to be different?
Switches

 

Went hill climbing today in the UK and this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier-Bentley was running. Its a more extreme version of your idea!

 

Dave- That is an air-cooled engine designed to have 100+ knot wind blowing over it when it is making hp. Close it in and it will overheat big-time and probably cause fires unless well insulated, and insulating will make the overheating worse. Not a good plan.

If you want to cram an aircraft engine in a car, use a watercooled engine, like the Brits did with various RR aircraft engines. OX-5s were 90 hp and water-cooled and P/W sucked. How about a Falcon V12, not the WW-I RR version, but the version used in the subscale Mustangs?

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

On a smaller scale, and it works,

The Feuling W3.

Jim Feuling, owner of Feuling R&D in Ventura, California (www.Feuling.com), realized that, while nothing exceeds like cubic inches, the current crop of big-bore kits for Harley-Davidson's V-twins were reaching the upper limits of practical power generation. Feuling decided that, in order to add a new wrinkle to the displacement wars, he wanted to build an engine with 50 percent more displacement than Harley's Twin Cam 88 with the 95-cubic-inch factory upgrade kit installed. The result of Feuling's idea takes the form of the working prototype shown here. Looking strangely familiar yet completely alien, the Feuling W3 may be the shape of things to come for those who fancy power cruisers.
2000 Feuling W3

Feuling's creation is at its core both incredibly simple and maddeningly complicated. Simply put, why not just graft an additional cylinder onto Harley's robust Twin Cam design? The result would be the desired 50 percent increase in displacement while utilizing parts that are widely available from either H-D or the aftermarket. The complicated part would be, well, actually acting on the idea. This stumbling block, however, wasn't a problem for Feuling.

Get hard on the gas and the W3 delivers enough power to the drive belt to twist the modified Dyna frame. The Progressive Suspension handles the bump absorption duties well. The Dunlop K591 just doesn't offer enough grip to keep the rear tire from spinning up during high-rpm shifts in the lower gears.

The full article here, http://www.motorcyclecruiser.com/roadtests/feuling_w3/index.html
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It could possibly still be used as a core for rebuilding depending on its condition. It was run out of its TBO most likely which just means a recommended time between overhaul. Our Stearman has a -13 (300 HP) with a 2B20 Hamilton Standard. It would sure be nice to build that one of yours up for a spare.

Unfortunately the plane is in Washington and I'm in Georgia. Crap.

By the way, I never looked at it as a good guy/ bad guy thing, it would just be a shame to see that's all. If it were me doing what you want I think I'd find an old air boat and get an engine off one of those the right size. They use modified airplane flat engines which don't have to conform to FAA rules, making them cheaper since most don't have data plates anymore. They would be lighter and smaller than a big radial but you still would need good airflow accross the fins.