Intake burnt, oil gasket leak.

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by Sternjaeger

Oh puh-lease Moggy

You really expected to hear Sir Stanley Hooker saying "actually...erm... our engines were a bit like cottage farm compared to the German ones, but hey, we had a little gizmo that they didn't have!"

Allowing to fly a plane with an engine that didn't permit negative G manouvres was simply criminal, but that's all they had, so let's not get carried away with your love for the Spit and Hurri, you can't change the fact that the DB601 was a superior engine,period.

I reckon that the struts for the tail horizontal surfaces on the Me109 as opposed to the clean Spit and Hurri tail section makes more of an interesting story, there's actually an espionage tale about it too, with a German agent was trying to steal the secret of the tail structure in the UK. I remember overhearing the conversation some years ago, but cant remember the details.

Just because it was more complicated doesn't mean it was superior. Any engine configuration with inverted cylinders tends to trap oil and other fluids in the inverted cylinder heads, leading to hydraulic lock on ignition and other fun things. There are reasons why there is only one surviving DB60X engine.

Originally Posted by Voyager

Just because it was more complicated doesn't mean it was superior. Any engine configuration with inverted cylinders tends to trap oil and other fluids in the inverted cylinder heads, leading to hydraulic lock on ignition and other fun things. There are reasons why there is only one surviving DB60X engine.

well actually the DB engines weren't more complex. The inverted cylinders solution had its valid reasons:

1) improved fwd visibility: your nose section is tapered upwards and your exhausts are not bang in your face like on the Merlin.

2) better protection of injection system: Hurris and Spits caught fire like torches because of the inlet pipes being on top of the engines, in a very vulnerable position. In the DB engines they were under the engine, in a more protected area.

3) Room for cannon: the space below the engine meant you could actually fit a big ass cannon on the plane axis, which was accurate being in the roll axis and wouldn't affect manouverability like cannons on wings. The narrow section on the top meant easy installation of machineguns very close to the roll axis as well.

4) oil recovery on the DB engine is quite clever and efficient.


the fact that there aren't many DB engines in working order surviving today is for two simple reasons: spare parts availability and airframes to be fitted to. Merlin and P&W engines were produced and maintained well after WW2 and there are still factories and maintenance shops that keep or produce spare parts stock. The engineering of the components is quite a sophisticated thing to do (see if you can find the assembly diagram of a DB crankshaft to have an idea of what I'm talking about), and if there's not a market request for it then there's no market, simple..

[Tacoma74]

Originally Posted by Sternjaeger

well actually the DB engines weren't more complex. The inverted cylinders solution had its valid reasons:

1) improved fwd visibility: your nose section is tapered upwards and your exhausts are not bang in your face like on the Merlin.

2) better protection of injection system: Hurris and Spits caught fire like torches because of the inlet pipes being on top of the engines, in a very vulnerable position. In the DB engines they were under the engine, in a more protected area.

3) Room for cannon: the space below the engine meant you could actually fit a big ass cannon on the plane axis, which was accurate being in the roll axis and wouldn't affect manouverability like cannons on wings. The narrow section on the top meant easy installation of machineguns very close to the roll axis as well.

4) oil recovery on the DB engine is quite clever and efficient.


the fact that there aren't many DB engines in working order surviving today is for two simple reasons: spare parts availability and airframes to be fitted to. Merlin and P&W engines were produced and maintained well after WW2 and there are still factories and maintenance shops that keep or produce spare parts stock. The engineering of the components is quite a sophisticated thing to do (see if you can find the assembly diagram of a DB crankshaft to have an idea of what I'm talking about), and if there's not a market request for it then there's no market, simple..

Plus the fact that most of the "Nazi war machine" was stripped and scrapped after the war was over. The allies simply had no use for anything that was surrendered to them, so it was all dismantled melted down and made into something else.

[Azimech]

Originally Posted by Voyager

There are reasons why there is only one surviving DB60X engine.

Are you sure about that?

Edit: according to this list there are at least 4 airworthy 109's on the planet, excluding Buchons of course.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...chmitt_Bf_109s

A whole lot more in storage or undergoing restoration.