Jay Leno's Garage - the Merlin engine

Amazing on so many levels!

 

The book he was showing in the video is an excellent read on the development of the piston engines the allies used in WWII. And the Landcaster flying over with a 4 merlins in sync. is music to the ears.

 

Hello, not sure yes the Merlin is a wonderful engine, but didn't the P-51d originally have Allisons and then went to the Rolls Royce Engine which gave them the power and longer range that gave them the edge over the Axis.

 

The Merlin is one reason that the de Havilland Mosquito is my favorite WWII aircraft. The fighter-bombers that did most of the daring low-level raids used single-stage engines like this one. The P-51 used the V-1650-7, which had two-stage supercharging which was superior at high altitudes.

(If I would put forward another possible choice for "greatest aero piston engine", I would suggest the Pratt & Whitney R-2800 18-cylinder radial. Consider the large number of successful airplanes that it powered.)

Here is a video of the Canadians' Lancaster taking off at the Virginia Beach airshow in 2013. While I did not shoot the video, I was there and witnessed this takeoff.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e78QY4y5SI[/ame]

Incidentally, I own both of the books that Jay showed in the video, and I can recommend both of them highly.

 

As far as how engines sound, my picks all have 12 cylinders. Automotive-wise, I'd choose any Ferrari 12 of the 60s or 70s, whether V-12 or flat-12. And aviation-wise, clearly the Merlin!

 

That is a pretty sound...if not beautiful. It's it's own. Like none other. And it resonates...with the soul.

 

Re R2800. I was thinking the same thing. That engine was literally bullet proof and provided strong and reliable power to many fighters and bombers and has to be not only the best radial engine but the best engine period. Power, durability, low maintenance, dependable, and could take damage and keep running. Nothing like it.

 

Agree... R-2800... Hellcat, Corsair, 'Jug', etc. The best engine over the course of the war. IMO. (Love the sound of a big radial.)

The Brits will disagree as the Merlin won the Battle of Britain.


I read that the P-51A with the Allison performed so poorly that they were turned down by the US... and packed off to the Brits.
They also agreed that it was not a competitive plane and decided to salvage them with a swap to the supercharged Merlins.

Voila'.

...and the US did a second take and installed US made Packard Merlins.

Not sure if it's true or not...

 

I seem to remember that the Allison lacked an adequate supercharger set up and it limited the high altitude performance of the P-51A and the P-39. For some reason the US Army Air Corps didn't believe in the value of the super charger. The P-39 was an effective ground attack weapon with the Russians.

 

This week,the RAF has grounded all of the Merlin powered historic flight,due to a fault (not specified) found in one of the RR Merlins. Having run reliably for 75 years,I wonder what the problem is. I hope they can overcome the problem,and make required mods.

 

Absolutely. That's why I'm glad that, after an absence, there are now flying Mosquitos again.

 

The Allison was a perfectly good engine below 10,000 feet, which it why it worked so well with the Soviets. At high altitudes it needed turbocharging, which only the P-38 had. At war's end, Allison finally developed good supercharging for its engine, which was used that way in some F-82 Twin Mustangs.

 

A pretty good hit parade for the R-2800: B-26, P-47, P-61, F4U, F6F, F7F, F8F, A-26, PV, AF, AJ, C-46, C-82, C-123, Martin 2-0-2/4-0-4, CV-240/340/440, H-37, DC-6.....that's quite an all-star team!

 

What engine did the B29 have ? I know it was a big radial, but read somewhere it was terribly unreliable and caused many B29 losses, so I can think it cant be and R2800 as that seemed to work in everything else,
As a brit of course I love the Merlin sound (although I think the Griffon is better), but the sound of a big radial firing up and billowing smoke out is the best.
Just this last weekend I heard a P38 in full song for the first time, what a noise that is....that whistle... awesome..

 

Isn't that the Aircraft Engine Union's mandatory retirement age????

 

R-3350 twin cyclone... turbosupercharged. Big horsepower.

Cooling issues on takeoff at full load (which was pretty much every takeoff in wartime, had a lot of magnesium so the engines themselves caught fire at times. That was the end of the plane as the wing would catch and separate from the plane.

The electric controlled props were also a big problem, causing engine failure.


They were used postwar on airliners; Constellation, DC-7 as turbo compound versions and were better, but it was not uncommon for a TWA Connie to land with 3 turning in London after an Atlantic flight.


The later B-50 (B-29 on steroids) had the R-4360, 4 row, 28 cyl monster, over 3,000 HP. They were more reliable.

 

Beautiful sound from a beautiful engine, thanks for sharing!

 

When you look at the design of the Merlin engine, you have to wonder just how much we have LOST in engineering and manufacturing over time.

These were designed with pencil on paper, built with normal tools by hand, and without computers assisting them.

Could we do that today? I'm not sure.

In fact, I'm not sure anyone today can do math in their heads without a calculator!

 

The guys with whom I went to college at Harvey Mudd could. easily.

 

When I was in PD I worked with many engineers who often made "rough" calculations in their head that were within small percentages of final instrument calculations. If you asked them to explain it to you, they couldn't do it in plain english because it always broke down into mathematical functions. Some of those guys are scary. I gave a talk recently about my aviation work and some of the young folks that looked at some of my old drawings couldn't get over that they were done by hand on linen and that all the airplane structural parts were drawn by hand full size. Please see parkzart.com/about/ My website that has the video made of my narrating my art. Also on YouTube
Stories Of Bob Parks Art At The Schack Art Center 2017.