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Mystery Engine.

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Stan Thomas
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Mystery Engine.

Post by Stan Thomas »

And now for something completely different!

Harking back to the glory days of sleeve valve Daimler's, can anyone identify this engine, which I came across whilst idling around on the 'net??

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C423544

P.S.
No, it's not of Daimler origin!

Christopher Storey
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Christopher Storey »

I believe it may be from an Argyll. It looks as though it could have the sleeve system devised by Peter Burt in Scotland and McCollum in Canada and used later by Bristol in their aero engines, as opposed to the Knight system used by Daimler

Vortex O'Plinth
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Vortex O'Plinth »

The fact that the engine is for sale in France suggests a possible continental origin? Voisin, Panhard, Peugeot and Minerva were all producing 4-cylinder sleeve vale engines in the 1920's - could be from one of these?

Your mention of the sleeve valve Bristol aero engines Christopher, reminded me that one of my first basic training jobs as an engineering apprentice with the Bristol Aeroplane Company was to strip and re-assemble a Hercules engine....
Capture.JPG
A serious exercise in valve timing!
Nick

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Christopher Storey
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Christopher Storey »

Hell's teeth !!

When were you there ? An old friend of mine, John Miles , was a Bristol Apprentice in the mid sixties or thereabouts

Vortex O'Plinth
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Vortex O'Plinth »

Christopher Storey wrote: Wed May 10, 2017 8:36 am When were you there ? An old friend of mine, John Miles , was a Bristol Apprentice in the mid sixties or thereabouts
I joined Bristol's in 1960 (although that year it became part of the BAC conglomerate) as a student apprentice and left the Company in '68. Your friend and I would probably have been contemporaries - the apprentice population those days ran into the hundreds - although the name doesn't ring a bell. The breadth and quality of the engineering training there was superb by any standards.

Having qualified, my first job was as a Design Engineer on Concorde, which I left after three years to do something more exciting - designing hearing aids!!?
Nick

"Don't bother with the Air & Space Museum - there's nothing to see.......".

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John-B
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by John-B »

Vortex O'Plinth wrote: Wed May 10, 2017 9:10 am
Christopher Storey wrote: Wed May 10, 2017 8:36 am When were you there ? An old friend of mine, John Miles , was a Bristol Apprentice in the mid sixties or thereabouts
I joined Bristol's in 1960 (although that year it became part of the BAC conglomerate) as a student apprentice and left the Company in '68. Your friend and I would probably have been contemporaries - the apprentice population those days ran into the hundreds - although the name doesn't ring a bell. The breadth and quality of the engineering training there was superb by any standards.

Having qualified, my first job was as a Design Engineer on Concorde, which I left after three years to do something more exciting - designing hearing aids!!?
Off-topic, but so many people connected with Bristol. I was brought up in Bristol, lived in Frenchay but long before Kevin Bennett; David Nancekievill (SP250 owner) lived in Bristol and worked at Frenchay Hospital, also I had a friend called Sandy Rostron who worked on Concorde testing to destruction as I remember, but I've lost contact with him. My father had a Bristol 401.

I remember the continuous stream of traffic every morning from Downend where many workers lived via Frenchay to Filton, mainly on motorbikes and bicycles in the 1940s and 1950s.

There was also David Langfield, an office worker of some sort at the Filton Works, who I played cricket with. He must have had some private money because when I had a fourth hand Dart from 1968 to 1973 he got a brand new E-type hard-top.

NickDeAth
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by NickDeAth »

Well Mr O'Plinth sooner you than me with all that gearing. I have managed to sort out just about everything mechanical that has been thrown at me over the years but that takes the biscuit!

Nick
"Nick - do you think you will ever put that old car back together again?"

Fossil
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Fossil »

I live less than 10 miles from what is left of the Argyll factory in Alexandria at the southern end of Loch Lomond. It was the first purpose-built car factory in the world I believe. What remains is the splendid frontage of the factory, the office block, now preserved and in use as an outlet shopping mall, of course, with marble pillared hall and marble staircase. The firm's founder lived in a house just along the road from ours, which was unfortunately demolished to make way for a block of apartments about 20 years ago. He died from food poisoning having established the company and following this it experienced a steady decline in its fortunes. There are echoes of that era of engineering ingenuity all around here: the house in which John Logie Baird grew up is but 200 yards in another direction, still standing and occupied I'm glad to say. The Cutty Sark, of a slightly earlier era, was built near Alexandria in Dumbarton on the Clyde estuary.

I read some years ago that there was a legal battle between Argyll and Daimler concerning sleeve valves, the details of which I'm unaware; I think Argyll won the case although it was something of a Pyrrhic victory and contributed to the company's decline.

Am I correct in thinking that the Burt-McCollum sleeve valve system uses a single sleeve which both rotates (not completely, just a few degrees either way) and reciprocates? It must have reached a very high level of manufacturing quality, sophistication and reliability to have served so well in those superb Bristol radial aero-engines up to the Centaurus. Was it therefore inherently better than the Knight design?

Regards

Geoff

Vortex O'Plinth
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Vortex O'Plinth »

NickDeAth wrote: Wed May 10, 2017 8:55 pm Well Mr O'Plinth sooner you than me with all that gearing. I have managed to sort out just about everything mechanical that has been thrown at me over the years but that takes the biscuit!
Indeed! The sleeve valve drives on an in-line 4 cylinder engine can be tricky to follow - never mind on a 14 cylinder radial. Taking one apart and working through the sleeve design and actuation left me with a great deal of respect for the designer, Sir Roy Fedden. Modern jet engines are just giant blowtorches in comparison!

There's an interesting diagrammatic animation of the Bristol Hercules engine here...



...which while not a complete or entirely accurate representation of the operation, does give an idea of the three-dimensional complexity of such an engine. Imagine the result of getting one tooth out on setting up those gears.... :( :o
Nick

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Norfolk Lad
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Re: Mystery Engine.

Post by Norfolk Lad »

Think the timing may have slipped.
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