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| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 24-Mar-14 12:39 |  | | Views : 360 | | This stage complete, on to the other cylinder bank. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 23-Mar-14 17:26 |  | | Views : 397 | | The Gumster torques a bolt for a cylinder test fit. He fabricated a new crankcase today and the redesign worked better than expected. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 23-Mar-14 17:25 |  | | Views : 320 | | The basic shaping of the cylinder set is not yet completed but Gumby put a quick coat of paint on them and hastily installed them into the crankcase for a “look see”. He has been at engine construction for over a week and there is quite a bit of work remaining. That’s why I pay him well over minimum wage. Model fabrication pays better than making burgers at Burger King! |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Parked | 22-Mar-14 17:46 |  | | Views : 382 | |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 22-Mar-14 17:45 |  | | Views : 326 | |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 22-Mar-14 17:45 |  | | Views : 322 | | Good news/bad news....well not too bad of news! The GOOD: The cylinder assembly is progressing. I have a prototype of a valve mechanism in mind and one cylinder has a rocker arm valve stem and spring. My valve springs will be represented by coil springs. The real thing uses a spiral spring similar to a coiled inclined plane. A spring of this design is beyond my spring winding skill level. The BAD: The slightly modified kit crankcase is destined for the scrapheap. I extended it a tad to accommodate a more realistic cylinder array, but I did not extend it enough. I should have extended to the end of the fuse frame...live and learn. Fabricating a new, closer to scale, crankcase should not be a problem and actually it will make adding magnetos, spark plug wires, intake manifold, fuel lines, and the behemoth exhaust stacks a bit easier. Further cylinder assembly on hold until a suitable crankcase can be designed and constructed. I discovered an interesting fact regarding this engine. A lack of redundancy. While it used two magnetos, it had only 12 spark plugs. Each magneto servicing six cylinders, |
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| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 21-Mar-14 17:55 |  | | Views : 366 | | Slowly, very, very slowly the RA4 engine takes shape. Our first and last build of a 12 cylinder air cooled engine in detail. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 20-Mar-14 17:36 |  | | Views : 373 | | We somewhat assembled the front of the fuselage. A reference is needed for the engine space. You do not want to do all of this work and find that your power plant does not fit. So far, so good. After cutting the components for the cylinder heads, the parts count for the RA4 is now at 336. Now that the components are cut, I should have 12 complete cylinders by tomorrow, that is, if the Gumster comes home early tonight. He said something about a Thursday night bar crawl! |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Parked | 19-Mar-14 16:40 |  | | Views : 405 | | Thus far 228 components have gone into the fabrication of the RA4 engine abstract. I will venture to say that upon completion the total should exceed 300. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 19-Mar-14 16:39 |  | | Views : 400 | | Gumby had a hand in the assembly of the engine cylinder components. Some TLC and color and they should work out fine. Now his attention turns to 12 cylinder heads. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 18-Mar-14 18:20 |  | | Views : 440 | | Remembering that tomorrow I must take the wife for cataract surgery, the Gumster and I work a bit this evening producing a bank of 6 cylinders. |
| John M Oshust | ManzanoLaser Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.12a | Build | 18-Mar-14 12:57 |  | | Views : 391 | | Three cylinders sandwiches down, nine to go. Gumby multitasked and started framing the fuselage. |
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