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A projected enlarged capacity version of the Centaurus was designed by Roy Fedden, cylinders were produced for this engine but it was never built. Known as the Bristol Orion (a name used previously for a variant of the Jupiter engine, and later re-used for a turboprop one) this development was also a two-row, 18 cylinder sleeve valve engine with the displacement increased to 4,142 cubic inches (67.9 l).[
That would be interesting. Is there any practical limit to how many cylinders a radial engine bank can have? I think I've seen pictures of five and three cylinder engines, and seems like somewhere I heard about a 6-cylinder radial, which of course would be "odd" since it was even. Not sure how the firing order would work on that-- maybe as if it were two separate 3-cylinders?
That would be interesting. Is there any practical limit to how many cylinders a radial engine bank can have? I think I've seen pictures of five and three cylinder engines, and seems like somewhere I heard about a 6-cylinder radial, which of course would be "odd" since it was even. Not sure how the firing order would work on that-- maybe as if it were two separate 3-cylinders?
Curtiss built a 6 cylinder radial in the 20s/early 30s. it was actually a two row engine. two rows of 3 cylinders.
Anzani 6-cylinder - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaThat would actually work with no problems. The one I remember but can't place was 6 cylinders all in one row.
"Bristol Orion - 22 cylinder version of the Centaurus, though it looks like it was never completed."
As far as I have seen, the Orion was a 18 cylinder engine with bigger cylinders (6.25" bore x 7.50" stroke) than the Centaurus (5.75" bore x 7.00" stroke).
I guess that Hitachi Ha-51 was not less promising then it. Hitachi was not so busy by other engine development as Mitsibishi was so it seems Ha-51 could be quickly completed refined. The other thing is that Sakae type cyls were really too small to be economically worthy.Ha-50 ...
It seems that, of all the 22 cylinders projects, this was the most promising. Basically Mitsubishi took the basic and sound Kasei engine (14 cylinders) and scaled it up to 18 (Ha-102) and 22 cylinders with little effort. Diameter was around 1450mm so it was pretty compact despite the number of pots.
I'm looking for every possible information regarding the few 11/22 cylinder radial engines ever produced. High quality pictures or drawings would be appreciated.
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Wright R-4090 - Prototype. 22 cyl. Only images scanned from books available
From my understanding, two stroke radial engines can be either with an odd or even number of cylinders. The only problem is scavenging which cannot be done through crankcase, in a radial. Forced induction scavenging and cross-head scavenging can be used instead.
Four stroke radials engines need an odd number of cylinder to have an even (pun intended!) distribution of the power strokes.