Al,
        Don't you have one rad in the cowl and the oil cooler and other rad in the wings? It would seem that with air flow through the cowl the rad in the cowl would be performing most of the cooling on the ground.  Great work!

Joe Berki
Limo EZ

At 07:48 AM 11/5/2004 -0500, Tommy James wrote:

Very nice looking workmanship, Al!  I am envious!

Those temps look somewhat high for the power level you reported, but flight tests will be the key indicator of cooling success. J

Tommy<><

 

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From: Rotary motors in aircraft [mailto:flyrotary@lancaironline.net] On Behalf Of Al Gietzen
Sent: Friday, November 05, 2004 1:45 AM
To: Rotary motors in aircraft
Subject: [FlyRotary] cowl on

 

I did the first post-cure of the custom cowl todayJ, that is, first runs with cowl on; and the faired spinner.  The big high for the day was finding that the negative pressure created by the prop, even at low rpm, drew significant cooling air through the radiator in the cowl and out the back.  Previous runs without the cowl had me convinced that I would need an auxiliary fan for idle and taxi time.  First indication I had was with the prop only at 700 rpm, I put my hand in front of the rad intake scoop and was surprised at the amount of air flow going in. 

 

I did simulated taxi and stop running; a bit over 2000 on the engine for a while, then some 1600, then some 2000; for about 10 minutes.  Temps got up to 200 on the oil and 195 on the coolant, and were pretty steady there. It was a 70 degree day, so it may not work on a 90 degree day; but I was very pleased.  I also think it is going to give me clean airflow into the prop.

(and I liked the way it looked, the third photo is the stock cowl for a Lyc).

 

It s these bright spots that keep us going on these projects.

 

Al (stock Lyc Nyet!     Rotory Da!)