kalamazookid wrote:
It would be interesting to see what powerplant would be used for a flyable Tempest. With a Napier Sabre being so expensive to build/ rebuild, operate and maintain, I wonder if the owner would look for another type with similar performance. I also wonder whether the radial engine Tempests would use R-3350s like a lot of the Sea Furies today do, rather than the Centaurus. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
Nice to see some active restoration taking place on these Tempests. I would love to see one in the air with a Hurricane and Sea Fury some day... what a Hawker Heritage Flight that would be!
A substitute powerplant may be required. But if the folks from The Vintage Aviator can build from scratch original spec engines, then a new Napier and or its parts can be built. Theres a question of FAA certification, I would think, requiring some modification to the design to modern standards for a 100% new engine. That, I think, would kick in a great financial burden to provide testing data for certification. Any thoughts from our restorers on that aspect? This is assuming there are no Napier parts floating about to incorporate into a restored engine, necessitating a 100% new engine. If the lump shown in the photo of SA-I (EJ693) on this post is our only proper engine with airworthy major components, perhaps this will suffice so long as a parts supply can be created to keep it serviceable, similar to Merlins and P&W's flying today, as accepted by the FAA. Also, the Planes of Fame resurrected the world's only Sakae engine for their Zero, and it flys at least several times a year. A much simpler engine for sure thats not that much different from a US made radial, unlike a Sabre! But this may be our closest pardigm, to my knowledge. Any others out there? Napiers are very complex, but even Ferrari can provide new vintage style engine blocks cast from scratch for older car restorations as an addtion to the original series sequence number. Vintage Ferrari's cost as much as a Mustang. Rhetorically speaking, would the world's only flying Napier engined Tempest be worth more than a Mustang? It may be worth more in Britain..
As others have noted here, money and inspiration makes it happen, but thats up to Mr. Weeks. I wonder what a discussion between Mr. Weeks and The Vintage Aviator regarding SA-I (EJ693) would sound like?
http://thevintageaviator.co.nz/projects ... f1a-engineAll very interesting and valid points. It might be costly, but worth while to have at least one running Napier Sabre and as you said it worked with POF's Nakajima Sake.
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