From my understanding of WWII inline fighters they were highly vulnerable to getting hit in the coolant system. Did any of the fighters have a redundant system?
Also was it possible to shutoff half of the engine and fly on six cylinders as we can do with “displacement on demand” engines today?
By: Jimw - 17th October 2004 at 13:02
there was one engine that flew during WWII with this facility, the Fairey P24. Unfortunately, fairey was not allowed to persue this remarkable engine, which consisted of two water cooled Flat 12’s with independant crankshafts, ignition and superchargers, each driving a contra-rotating airscrew. Total power output was 2000 hp Either could be shut down in flight. It flew in a fairey battle both in the UK and the US. As far as I know the only surviving example is in the FAA museum in Yeovilton UK.
By: Olivier Lacombe - 17th October 2004 at 04:32
No to both question.
If you switch off a magneto, all it does is shut down one set of spark plug in each cylinder. So on a V-12, you would have 12 plugs instead of 24 doing the job.
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October 17, 2004 at 4:03 am