Groundhog Thread Part Deux - P-39 Fantasy and Fetish - The Never Ending Story (Mods take no responsibility for head against wall injuries sustained)

Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules

Quite interesting, only one doubt I have. How do the water injection works? If you mix gasoline with water, don't it make harder to ignite the gasoline? How do you keep the water from freezing at high altitude? With a heater in the water tank? With exhaust gases?
The water is mixed with alcohol, usually methanol, to prevent freezing.
 
Quite interesting, only one doubt I have. How do the water injection works? If you mix gasoline with water, don't it make harder to ignite the gasoline? How do you keep the water from freezing at high altitude? With a heater in the water tank? With exhaust gases?
In the storage tank it is water, by the time it is introduced to the inlet manifold it is H2O as vapour/steam, the inlet charge is both heated and compressed, the "water's" job there in part is to cool the mixture.
 
The water is mixed with alcohol, usually methanol, to prevent freezing.
Topping off the water/meth and recording the amount consumed in the day's operations was part of the nightly servicing and inspection on our Fokker 27s. Crews were tasked with recording parameters for every takeoff, including duration of water/meth injection, which along with amount consumed, was fed into a computer which attempted to monitor the health of the RR Dart engines.
 
The Fairchild Metroliner in USAF (RC-26) service used water as well at high gross weights and hot temps. Our performance data went to 41C IIRC. It sucked to be the only thing flying on super hot days in the Middle East. We did not track anything other than a "wet" takeoff. The tough part was how to do a single engined missed without over torquing the engine and making your problems worse. Water would be required for a heavy / hot missed approach/ go around. While on the approach your power would be up on the good engine, then if required to go around, when you wanted the power up, you would have to pull it back in order to turn on the water, then push the power back up and not over torque the engine. You could be in the weather (IMC) or close to the ground.

The lesson to be learned is to not buy an airplane based on price alone…

Cheers,
Biff
 
The Fairchild Metroliner in USAF (RC-26) service used water as well at high gross weights and hot temps. Our performance data went to 41C IIRC. It sucked to be the only thing flying on super hot days in the Middle East. We did not track anything other than a "wet" takeoff. The tough part was how to do a single engined missed without over torquing the engine and making your problems worse. Water would be required for a heavy / hot missed approach/ go around. While on the approach your power would be up on the good engine, then if required to go around, when you wanted the power up, you would have to pull it back in order to turn on the water, then push the power back up and not over torque the engine. You could be in the weather (IMC) or close to the ground.

The lesson to be learned is to not buy an airplane based on price alone…

Cheers,
Biff
The only reason you guys had that plane was DOD's desire to keep Fairchild in business. On its merits, the Metroliner would have been consigned by the airline industry to the dumpster of history.
The Metro was a B26 Marauder; the BE1900/C12 a B25 Mitchell. The one tweaked to the Nth degree for the last 2% of possible performance with all of the issues that entails, while the other was a little less extreme, a little slower, more versatile, more reliable, easier to fly and maintain, and nowhere near as fragile. And no "wet" takeoffs needed, ever. In fact, not even equipped.
And you could briefly overtemp or overtorque a PT6 in an emergency without worrying about an imminent failure, or even a mandatory engine change. An HSI could be done overnight, if necessary, without dismounting the engine, and be ready for an AM departure.
 
On its merits, the Metroliner would have been consigned by the airline industry to the dumpster of history.
I always preferred working on Metro 23's over the King Air 350's, oddly enough. And rigging a TPE331 usually entailed using rig pins, as opposed to a PT6, which is more or less a performance art form. It doesn't make any sense, in retrospect, because the Beech is clearly a better aircraft, but something always bothered me about King Air/1900's. Maybe it was because something simple like removing the pilot seat damn near required the disassembly of the forward fuselage.
I guess a King Air usually keeps its fuel on the inside, instead of the hanger floor, so there is that...
 
I always preferred working on Metro 23's over the King Air 350's, oddly enough. And rigging a TPE331 usually entailed using rig pins, as opposed to a PT6, which is more or less a performance art form. It doesn't make any sense, in retrospect, because the Beech is clearly a better aircraft, but something always bothered me about King Air/1900's. Maybe it was because something simple like removing the pilot seat damn near required the disassembly of the forward fuselage.
I guess a King Air usually keeps its fuel on the inside, instead of the hanger floor, so there is that...

I used to work in King Air 200s, 300s, and 350s, and 1900Ds. I enjoyed working on them. Its a solid aircraft and pretty straightforward.

I know what you mean about removing a cockpit seat though. :lol:
 
The Oldsmobile Jetfire was the pioneer of turbocharging in cars (along with the Corvair). It used water injection which turned out to unpopular as people tended to forget to add the fluid.


Before the bean counters took over GM was a leader in car technology.

The first American car I learned the name of.
1631725262967.png
 
something always bothered me about King Air/1900's. Maybe it was because something simple like removing the pilot seat damn near required the disassembly of the forward fuselage.
I know what you mean about removing a cockpit seat though.
I don't know what your problem was. Our guys didn't seem to have that problem. Whenever I saw them working on or under the cockpit floor, the pilot seats would be back in the cabin in disassembled form. I never worked on the 1900 myself, as I was putting in so much time flying I didn't have much time for anything else.
 
I don't know what your problem was. Our guys didn't seem to have that problem. Whenever I saw them working on or under the cockpit floor, the pilot seats would be back in the cabin in disassembled form. I never worked on the 1900 myself, as I was putting in so much time flying I didn't have much time for anything else.

I'm not sure what configuration your Kingairs had, but the ones I worked on required the galley and cockpit dividers to be removed in order to slide the cockpit seats out of the seat rails.
 
I'm not sure what configuration your Kingairs had, but the ones I worked on required the galley and cockpit dividers to be removed in order to slide the cockpit seats out of the seat rails.
Our 1900s had no galley, just a coat rack behind the stub bulkhead on the FO side. IIRC the armrests and seat back came off the seat, the fore and aft limiting pins came out of the seat rails (the rear outboard one was a bastard), the seat's aft rail grips slid back and lifted out of the rail, then the seat slid off the forward end of the rail and lifted out.
We had some of the first airliner configured 1900s, including the prototype, UB1, N6667L. In fact the first editions of Beech's maintenance and operations manuals depicted 67L in our company livery. She had been a sales demonstrator and was the only one we had with an autopilot, a real POS not quite ready for prime time. We had to get an STC to disable and remove the AP, which was adopted by Beech and applied to new production, as airline customers were requesting their planes not have it, and it was part of the original type certificate. She would trim up so stable the autopilot was practically redundant.
 
Our 1900s had no galley, just a coat rack behind the stub bulkhead on the FO side. IIRC the armrests and seat back came off the seat, the fore and aft limiting pins came out of the seat rails (the rear outboard one was a bastard), the seat's aft rail grips slid back and lifted out of the rail, then the seat slid off the forward end of the rail and lifted out.
We had some of the first airliner configured 1900s, including the prototype, UB1, N6667L. In fact the first editions of Beech's maintenance and operations manuals depicted 67L in our company livery. She had been a sales demonstrator and was the only one we had with an autopilot, a real POS not quite ready for prime time. We had to get an STC to disable and remove the AP, which was adopted by Beech and applied to new production, as airline customers were requesting their planes not have it, and it was part of the original type certificate. She would trim up so stable the autopilot was practically redundant.

1900Ds have a lot more room than a King Air 350. Its much easier to remove the cockpit seats in a 1900D.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Back