Which country designed the best engines for WWII?

Which country designed the best aircraft engines for WWII?

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American made engines are the best looking engines of that era, and the better quality and functionality, RR's come close, but I think the american made RR's were better than made in UK. Sleeve valves are a good idea, but as we can all see not many have survived into modern times. There are still lots of aircraft that run American made radial engines, which is a testament to the quality etc. You don't see many at all of the other foreign made piston engines in flying planes. There must be a good reason for that. I guess parts availability is one of them. I like all of them, but the american engines are and were the best.
 
engguy said:
You don't see many at all of the other foreign-made piston engines in flying planes. There must be a good reason for that
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Most of them were

torched
buried
melted down

at war's end. The rumour mill has it that RR units were buried brand new, still wrapped in vapour-proofs, in concrete footings around the old Castle Bromwich site. There is a similar rumour, on a smaller scale, for the High Post site near Salisbury.
 

Don't forget all the German engines that were not used in post war aircraft, oh yeah because they lost the war...

I don't think one can honestly use the fact that the engines are still being used in aircraft today as a reason to why they are the best. The aircraft just happen to still be flying. The few German aircraft that are still flying, happen to be using Germany engines, same with the British aircraft and Russian aircraft, I guess those planes are not as good because of the engines...
 
engguy said:
but I think the american made RR's were better than made in UK.
Click to expand...

No they werent it didnt matter wether they were made in Rolls Royce factories in Derby, Crewe or Glasgow. In the Ford factory in Manchester or the Packard factory in Detroit all Merlins were built to the same rigid standards and were to all intents and purposes interchangeable.

Packard made some improvements to the Merlin, the Pontiac silver lead indium main bearing shells were one improvement that Rolls Royce tested found to be better than there own copper lead version and then incorporated into Rolls production. The Wright supercharger drive was also introduced by Packard and found to be an improvement.

As far as workmanship goes the engines were the same a Packard engine might be better than a Rolls but the same could apply the other way round engines even today are not identical you can get a good un and a bad un in 2 otherwise identical Mercedes, I am a mechanic in a Mercedes dealership so know what I am talking about. Rolls Royce Derby was where the new models and the specials were built and they were often hand built but particulary at Ford Manchester and RR Glasgow all other production in Britain was on the tightest production lines possible equally as efficent as Packard Detroit.

My father was an RAF mechanic he loved working on Packard engines not because the engines were any different but because every crated Packard engine came with a complete set of AF tools, some of which he liberated and I still possess.
 
It is pretty much a question of parts availability.

Even before WW II some DC-3s had their engines changed about a dozen times.

With both the R-2800 and R-3350 powering DC-6s 7s, Lockheed Constellations, Martin and Convair twins, C-119s and C-123 and assorted other transport aircraft well into the 50s for new construction, the market for both new engines in addition to spare parts lasted much longer than other large piston engines.
The British engines never were sold in anywhere near the numbers that the American engines were in the late 40's and early 50s.
Nobody wanted the warmed over French pre-war designs and Arsenal's attempt to market French built Jumo 213s didn't get far (a dozen flying boats?).

For large commercial aircraft only the larger engines made economic sense. The R-2800s were offering 2400-2500hp for take off with water injection and or 108/135 fuel. The R-3350s could get up to 2500-2800hp for take off without turbo compounding. With thousands of each engine in use the parts availability (and trained mechanics) was pretty much world wide (aside from the iron curtain) compared to the much smaller number of Bristol engines and the few commercial Merlins.
While the 18 cylinder radials used more cylinders and spark plugs than liquid cooled V-12s, they didn't have the liquid cooling system to maintain. The V-12s used 3 or 4 valves per cylinder so valve maintenance wasn't that different. The Radials operated at lower RPM, less piston speed, and lower cylinder pressures.
The only viable German engines would have been the Jumo 213 or the DB 603. Any other German engine that had made it passed the experimental stage was too small.
In the US production of the R-2600 stopped dead at the end of WW II. P&W tried offering a 14 cylinder engine using R-2800 cylinders but only SAAB used it for 18 (?) airliners.
 
I voted Germany for their use of fuel injection, the elegant hydraulic clutch for the supercharger on the DB600 series; the cooling fan and the Kommandogerät on the BMW801. If the germans had the resources and fuels the americans had, they would have dominated in the field of engines IMHO.

I like the Ash82FN too, so the Soviet Union is my second choice.

There is nothing wrong with the Merlin but I feel it's overrated.

Post-war, I have deep respect for the Wright R3350 Turbo Compound.
 
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FLYBOYJ said:
The radials designed by the US were a major part of the civilian market for years. From the PW 985 through the Curtiss 3350, look how many pre-war and post war aircraft used Pratt or CW round engines, and there are many around today....
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The reason that the Jumos and DBs are under represented post war is that they were deliberately destroyed at the end of the war by the allies. the Allison wasn't decent until 1950. If you compare RRs, DBs, Jumos and Klimovs you will notice that RRs were the most tedious to maintain. Engine changes took up to 24hrs and most of the front end had to be disassembled. DBs could be unhooked and swapped out in 12 minutes while the rest of the crew topped the gas and refilled the ammo tanks. The Jumos and DBs as well as the BMW 801 fit the same fire wall and the two V 12s had their accessories in the same places to simplify changing brands.Of all the types only the Germans had unilever flight controls and automatic blowers. Hydraulics and electrical connections were color coded and quick disconnect equipped. Merlins had flat head screws and bent wires and lots of hose clamps.
 
Modern auto engines resemble DBs and Jumos more than the others. For size comparisons, DB 605 33.7 liters, DB 603 44 l, RR Merlin 24 liters. The DB 603 had 2700 cid and ran at 2000 hp.
 

Can you provide a link to original documents proving a DB aero engine could be swapped out in 12 minutes. Thats waaaay to quick I think, I would believe you if you said 12 hours. A modern tank has a unit engine and transmission and is designed to be quickly swapped out in less than an hour with the use of a crane. These power packs are just dropped in place with most connectors and the final drive shaft automatically locking in place. An aero engine has to be hung on the firewall and have the longerons carefully fitted round the engine. Then the cowling has to be fitted, the prop fitted, all connections checked all controls checked, then the engine needs to be ground checked. All this is something that needs time and double checking as you go along. A tank engine with a fuel line leaking or a throttle link jamming is dangerous but not neccasarily fatal. A lot less fun in an aeroplane
 
Dannybb55 said:
Modern auto engines resemble DBs and Jumos more than the others.
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Modern auto engines resemble WWII V12 aero engines only in the fact that they are all multi clinder, Otto cycle, water cooled and run on gasoline. Otherwise its like comparing my laptop to an IBM 5100 PC.
 
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Many German blowers were "automatic" because they used a variable speed drive. British blowers had a manual gear change but an automatic boost control once they were in gear as did later US Planes. Some US planes had "automatic" blowers, they were the later turbo ones. Both the US and British by the end of the war had some planes equipped with single lever controls.

I am not sure how the Allison "got decent in 1950" as it had been out of production for about 2 years at that point.

I find the 12 minute engine swap a little tough to swallow too. These engines weigh 3/4 of ton without the propeller. Just moving that much weight 15-20 feet twice in 12 minutes with out major power equipment (fork lift trucks?) would be quite a feat.

I love the conspiracy theory too. The Allies destroyed all those Germans engines why?
And the airlines, who didn't really care whose engines they used for the next 10-15 years as long as it gave them the best profit margin didn't rediscover the German engines why? Jumo 213s being built in France post war and tooling available for BMW 801s in France.
Airliners could and did go through engines at the rate of a set of engines every few months. Many airframes used well over a dozen sets of engines before the airframe was retired. Airlines would have used what ever engine and installation that gave them the best hours in the air to maintenance hours ratio.
 
Well given my lack of technical knowledge it would be naive of me to pick the best designed engine...

...but I can certainly tell you which sounds the best!
 
Interesting.
I see that the last piston engined fighters in the Fleet Air Arm / RAF were radials. The Hawker Sea Fury 's Centaurus was the final development of the Bristol Engine Company's series of sleeve valve radial aircraft engines, an 18-cylinder, two-row design that eventually delivered over 3,000 hp (2,200 kW). It was one of the largest piston aircraft engines to enter production. 56 Spark plugs too !!
I'm puzzled why radials survived longer that in-line liquid cooled engines.
Any know why?
Cheers
John
 
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