Warbird Information Exchange

I received this via email and just had to pass it on.

DEDICATED TO ALL THOSE WHO FLEW BEHIND
ROUND ENGINES

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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...

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, 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. 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 WWII pilot (or his son, or anyone who flew them in
Korea or Vietnam) in remembrance of that "Greatest Generation"

_________________
Col Craig Duck
Life Member CAF
Life Member YAF
Life Member EAA

That's beauty, eh.

_________________
Phil K.
Yankee Air Museum
Systems Admin / Ramp Crew / Professional Photo Ruiner

And real round engine aircraft had a third crewman to massage and talk sweetly to those lovely sounding engines.

Long live the flight engineers!

Hey Scott how cum i'm stuck on 93 post? I won't ever get my commission this way.

Love it.

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http://aircrewbookreview.blogspot.com/

I used this text in a short video clip I edited for the Warbirds of Norway website last winter.
The video clip was filmed in december and the temperature
was -7 degrees Celsius (approx 19 farenheit) and the R-985 hadn't been started for a few weeks....

http://www.warbirds.no/videoer/985startup.wmv

Erik

Oh HELL YEAH! ... cough, belch, smoke, more smoke, even more smoke, cough - belch, smoke, ...

THAT sound is the greatest in the world ... the only way to improve it is add more voices (cylinders) ... maginificent harmony.

Wade

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Website: http://www.wademeyersart.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Wade.Meyers.Studios

after watching the hars connie at dusk at avalon i think i might understand this and agree entirelpaul

I just love radials--------big ones, little ones-------clean ones, oily ones!!

The Only Way to GO...!!!!

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FLY SAFE--FLY FAST
F4U Corsair Historian
Mint Moore III

<I just love radials--------big ones, little ones-------clean ones, oily ones!!>

A clean radial ? the only clean radial is one just out of overhaul or a dead one in a museum. If it ain't dripping, it's out of oil

The subject of starting a reluctant radial engine (aren't they all?) reminds me of an incident I had at the TSTI campus in Waco, TX. At the end of our recip class in the A&P curriculum, we all headed out to the ramp for our "special treat". That was starting an engine on an old Convair. Well, I drew first straw. After climbing up in the cockpit (whoops, flight deck) with the instructor and obtaining clearance from the ground (fire ex in place and manned), we began to coax the old girl to life. The start was pretty straight forward, and after verifying all the cockpit gauges were reading in their proper ranges I glanced outside and immediately saw quite a consternation amongst my classmates. Fearing the worst, I started going thru the shutdown procedure. After we had exited the aircraft, we found the crowd gathered around a bunch of charbroiled baby birds, some still in their flaming nest. You've got to be kidding me! I was relieved no one was hurt, but was robbed of getting to play with the throttle and mixture controls a bit. Next guy to the cockpit. Needless to say, I kinda veered away from chicken nuggets for a couple of weeks.

Ok, so here's a question that I never seem to get a solid answer on.....now, my dad, brother-in-law's dad, and myself have had long discussions on this (usually sitting in a restaurant up in Oshkosh during airventure) and we think we have the answer, but I'll throw it to the group first-

Question: Why is a radial engines sound so distinctly different from any other engine design? It doesn't matter what size, what rpm, what direction it's coming at you, or any other factor that could be present, but if you hear one running, one can always tell it's a radial!

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Life's a Pitts

Because that is how engines are supposed to sound. Your ears know what a perfect sound is, it just happens to be a radial engine. [/quote]

Like a beautiful woman God designed them that way.