Round Engines

cessna170bdriver · Post by **cessna170bdriver** » Fri May 19, 2006 4:07 am

I hope this doesn't offend anyone. For some of you it will probably make you wax nostalgic. The first airplane engine I ever started was when I was about 9 or 10, under Dad's watchful eye. It was hanging on the left wing of a DC-3...

Miles

_____________________________________________________

We gotta get rid of those turbines, they're ruining
aviation and our hearing...

A turbine is too simple minded, it has no mystery. The air
travels through it in a straight line and doesn't pick up any of the pungent fragrance of engine oil or pilot sweat.

Anybody can start a turbine. You just need to move a switch
from "OFF" to "START" and then remember to move it back to "ON" after a
while. My PC is harder to start.

Cranking a round engine requires skill, finesse and style.
You have to seduce it into starting. It's like waking up a horny
mistress. On some planes, the pilots aren't even allowed to do it, (KC-97 for one)...

Turbines start by whining for a while, then give a lady-like poof and start whining a little louder.

Round engines give a satisfying rattle-rattle, click-click,
BANG, more rattles, another BANG, some flames, a big macho FART or two, more clicks, a lot more smoke and finally a serious low pitched roar. We like that. It's a GUY thing...

When you start a round engine, your mind is engaged and you
can concentrate on the flight ahead. Starting a turbine is like flicking on a ceiling fan: Useful, but, hardly exciting.

When you have started his round engine successfully your
crew chief looks up at you like he'd let you kiss his girl too!

Turbines don't break or catch fire often enough,leading to
aircrew boredom, complacency and inattention.

A round engine at speed looks and sounds like it's going to
blow any minute. The tiniest change of vibrations must be checked out. This helps concentrate the mind !

Turbines don't have enough control levers or gauges to keep
a pilot's attention. There's nothing to fiddle with during long
flights.

Turbines smell like a Boy Scout camp full of Coleman Lamps.
Round engines smell like God intended machines to smell.

Pass this on to an old rotary engine pilot in remembrance
of that "Greatest Generation"

-author unknown-

lowNslow · Post by **lowNslow** » Fri May 19, 2006 4:43 am

So true. Having flown DC3 freighters in a previous life, I can totally relate.

Post by **GAHorn** » Fri May 19, 2006 6:45 am

I had about 55 hours total time and a fresh Private License when Ray Lindsey (D.M. for Avion, Inc., a hopeful competitor to Trans-Texas) asked if I'd like to fill the right seat on a couple of ferry flights to move some of the company DC-3s. I was instructed on how to walk the props thru on the preflight, then we climbed aboard and I was given a rudimentary lesson on what my duties would be .... (Don't touch nothin'!)... and then the captain began the engine-start checklist. After about 10 blades had passed, he cursed the engine for not starting,...and I looked up and saw the magneto switches still in the "off" position.
I asked if they weren't supposed to be "on".... He cursed a blue streak, flipped 'em to the "on" positon while the engines were still crankin' and a huge belch of blue-black smoke, a rattle, and a ROAR.... and it was ALIVE!
He told me I'd just earned my first takeoff. What a RIDE! Whoooo-Hooooo! zigzagzigzagzigZAGandwewereAIRBORNE!
My first multi-engine time in my logbooks! DC-3!

dacker · Post by **dacker** » Fri May 19, 2006 1:02 pm

A few years ago I had the opportunity to fly a 450 Ag Cat for a couple of hours... what a hoot!

That P&W sounded just beautiful, and the cockpit was the most ergonomically correct I have ever experienced. I can see how a crop duster can spend 8 hours in one! The only problem was paying the piper after landing and filling the fuel tank back up. That old round engine was thirsty!
David

davevramp · Post by **davevramp** » Fri May 19, 2006 11:26 pm

I worked as a support person on a 450 AgCat never got to fly it . Loved the sound. Made the crop duster a little on the hard of hearing.. He spent 33 years dusting. You could walk up to him you would point at you wrist and say what color is you socks and he would say â€œquarter to 3â€. I loved to hand propping that motor. Easer that my c-85 but much more dangerous.
dave

Post by **GAHorn** » Sat May 20, 2006 1:14 am

The last round-motored airplane I flew was a Lockheed Lodestar with Wright 1820's mounted just at the shoulder and the blades swinging about 12 " from your ankles. Made the eardrums ITCH the dang things were so loud! No wonder all those old-timers are deaf!

Dave Clark · Post by **Dave Clark** » Sat May 20, 2006 2:21 pm

Ten years sitting behind the 330 Jake in my 195. Lovely

The last REAL airplane Cessna made.

buchanan · Post by **buchanan** » Sun May 21, 2006 3:33 am

Sorry, I canâ€™t contain myself any longer. I flew the Air Force version of the Navy A-3D Skyraider ( the USAF called it the A-1). It sported a Wright Cyclone 3350 with a compound blower. Takeoff power was 2800 and 56 inches. Our combat strike power setting was 2600 and 36 inches. We were restricted to strike power in case of a go around because there wasnâ€™t sufficient rudder to counteract a torque-roll. Since our mission was primarily search and rescue ( SAR) call sign Sandy, the majority of our airplanes were H and J (single seat) models so we could see out of both sides easily. We also had a couple E and a couple G models which we called â€œfat-facesâ€. They were side by side configurationâ€¦. You can go to http://www.skyraider.org/ and check out the web site my room-mate in SEA Byron Hukee has developed and mentored for some years. It has some really good information, not only about the airplane but also about the SAR mission.

I crop-dusted for 20+ years and never flew a Cat. I always had a hankering to though. I did fly a Thrush with a 600hp Pratt 1350 for a short time and I owned a B-1 Callair with a Pratt 985 on it. It was a good fertilizing airplane when you were up at power-line height but it was way sluggish on aileron and I never really got super good at spraying with it.

Bottom lineâ€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦â€¦I really like my C-170 with the Avcon conversion.

Best regards, Buck Buchanan, Galena, AK

mit · Post by **mit** » Sun May 21, 2006 6:20 am

Guess I will have to fly out to Galena for a visit.

cessna170bdriver · Post by **cessna170bdriver** » Sun May 21, 2006 4:54 pm

Go to http://www.americanaeroservices.com/videos.htm for some videos of big round engines coming to life.

Miles

buchanan · Post by **buchanan** » Mon May 22, 2006 5:36 am

Hi Tim,

Come anytime. Our son and daughter and their families will be here from then end of June until the middle of July. Other than that we have extra bunks.

My airplane is now at Chena Marina Air Service getting an annual and the floats installed. Iâ€™m hoping to go in and get it next week.

I think my son Jon, knows you. He has a 170 also with the Avcon. He bought it from Craig at Frontier.

Why donâ€™t you send me your email address?

Best regards, Buck

philnino · Post by **philnino** » Mon Jun 05, 2006 10:56 pm

As a former DC-3 freighter with a little BE-18 time and a lot of busted knuckles turning wrenches I still get a hankering for that sound and smell. My BE-40 is just not the same. The 170a is the only thing that keeps me in turbines for a paycheck except maybe that safety and reliability thing!
Phillip

buchanan · Post by **buchanan** » Tue Jun 06, 2006 2:13 am

I monitor this list as well as the Seaplane list. I sent the same offer below to them.

As an aside there is a fellow doing a re-cap of the Roger Locher SAR (search and rescue) [he was down 22 days behind enemy lines]. 2 June was the 34th anniversary of his pick-up. I was a Sandy pilot on that mission. If anyone on the seaplane list wants a copy forwarded please send me a personal email.

I'll amend the last sentence to read Cessna 170 list.

My classmate in pilot school and room-mate during our A-1 tour in SEA
has a good web site portraying the Skyraider and it's mission. It is http://www.skyraider.org

Buck Buchanan, Galena Ak

Post by **GAHorn** » Tue Jun 06, 2006 3:39 am

Wow! Links about that mission:
http://afa.org/magazine/valor/0392valor.asp
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/au-24/ritchie.pdf

And about Locher's pilot:
http://www.pownetwork.org/bios/l/l068.htm

(the casualty figure in that report about Bob Lodge is incorrect, however. There were 58,249 American deaths in Vietnam, not including U.S. civilians.

N170CT · Post by **N170CT** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 7:45 pm

Buck,

Who is doing your annual at Chena Marina?? Just curious. Happen to know an A&P there named Jim ONeil (Northstar Aviation) and wondered if that was your guy.

And FWIW, I agree completely, there simply is no sound like a big round engine coming to life. The smoke, the belches, the slow climb to a smooth idle, can't help but wonder if the thing is going stay together. Of course, I am also partial to the sound of a merlin on a 360 overhead approach and a F104 in a hi-speed pass. Which of course is any pass in a 104

.
Regards, Chuck

The International Cessna 170 Association

Round Engines

Round Engines

450 round

Round Motors still make my head turn!