What's going to happen in the future

[Reno_Steve]

Air racing has really made a come back in the last few years.
Red Bull has created a series which although not really racing has introduced millions of spectators to the spectacle. I think crowds of 500,000 have been reported at some events.

True Unlimited air racing should try to take advantage of this new interest and show these huge crowds what real racing is like.

What classes are foreseen in the future ?
Can we make more exciting courses ?
Will we allow rocket planes at the Reno event ?

With greater crowds and TV coverage comes more sponsership , which will allow new aircraft and engines to be created specifically for air racing.

I am still looking forward to the time when a modern aircraft and engine can win the unlimited race. We still are using 40's and 50's designs which must eventually change.

[AirDOGGe]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

I think the main reason RB is doing so well is, they take the event to sites where there are lots of people nearby, rather than make everyone travel cross-country to some out-of-the-way location as races like Reno and Mojave do/did.

It's sort of like a traveling circus. If Ringling Brothers was opening in some town in another state it's doubtful you would make the effort to travel to it, but if the circus came to your town, it's more likely that you and your neighbors might attend.


As far as winning an unlimited race with a "modern" engine, I just don't see that happening. Due to the performance and reliability of modern turbines, nobody is developing piston engines of the size and caliber of the WWII motors anymore. The costs would be astronomical!

The Pond Racer was the closest to doing this, but they couldn't produce nearly enough reliable power from the Nissan V6's to keep up with the warbirds, and I know of no car racing engines that can produce the necessary CONTINUOUS power for long enough periods to survive an entire race.

There's just no subsitude for cubic inches!

[Reno_Steve]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

Very true.
Maybe we should be doing the same with Unlimited Air Racing.
I agree that using WW2 aircraft on low budgets requires a whole year of preparation to get the aircraft ready but using modern aircraft with modern engines should allow more races a year.
I would definately miss the old war birds and think we need to keep the same atmosphere these provide. If the money was there we could produce new replicas of the old war birds.

[AirDOGGe]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

Unfortunately, Unlimited racing requires lots of space, and space can be a premium where lots of people are found. It's a real catch-22.


Also, Red Bull (whose event requires a far smaller footprint) gets away with it by holding some of their events over water (like over the Bay with the San Francisco event), but I don't think the Unlimited folks would go for that. Far too dangerous,....and expensive if you mayday and have to ditch. None of the RB competitors are flying rare, million dollar birds.


Yea, you might be able to pull it off using smaller "modern aircraft with modern engines" (aren't there already formula races held in other locations around the USA and overseas?), but I don't believe those would attract nearly as many folk as the unlimiteds would.

Maybe it could be done with sport class-type aircraft, but they are flying so fast these days that they too will require lots of room for a course, and I doubt the FAA would allow them to overfly residential/commercially developed areas as would be required.

[MRussell]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

The Pond Racer was the closest to doing this, but they couldn't produce nearly enough reliable power from the Nissan V6's to keep up with the warbirds, and I know of no car racing engines that can produce the necessary CONTINUOUS power for long enough periods to survive an entire race.

There's just no subsitude for cubic inches!

IMHO, had Mr. Pond tried it with a pair of custom, aluminum small-block V8s, or Falconer V12s, things might have been different for the little racer.

[shadow]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

As far as winning an unlimited race with a "modern" engine, I just don't see that happening. Due to the performance and reliability of modern turbines, nobody is developing piston engines of the size and caliber of the WWII motors anymore. The costs would be astronomical!

The Pond Racer was the closest to doing this, but they couldn't produce nearly enough reliable power from the Nissan V6's to keep up with the warbirds, and I know of no car racing engines that can produce the necessary CONTINUOUS power for long enough periods to survive an entire race.

There's just no subsitude for cubic inches!

904ci DOHC 1200HP on pump gas. Add boost and you have 2000HP, add ADI and race gas and you have 2500HP+.

https://www.schubeckracing.com

[AirDOGGe]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

904ci DOHC 1200HP on pump gas. Add boost and you have 2000HP, add ADI and race gas and you have 2500HP+.

www.schubeckracing.com

As Thunder Engines (and later Orenda discovered), you can't just take a big aluminum V8 racing car engine and drop it into an aircraft. The unique torques and rotational vibrations induced by trying to spin a prop in varying conditions tear the bejeebers out of 'em.



We had a big discussion on this already in a Pond Racer topic.... link here:

http://www.aafo.com/hangartalk/showthread.php?t=2384&highlight=orenda

The January 1997 issue of Air & Space Smith. had a great article about this problem too, titled "POWER STRUGGLE: Wy car engines can't fly".

[Reno_Steve]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

Unfortunately, Unlimited racing requires lots of space, and space can be a premium where lots of people are found. It's a real catch-22.


Also, Red Bull (whose event requires a far smaller footprint) gets away with it by holding some of their events over water (like over the Bay with the San Francisco event), but I don't think the Unlimited folks would go for that. Far too dangerous,....and expensive if you mayday and have to ditch. None of the RB competitors are flying rare, million dollar birds.

Maybe it is time to go back to racing amphibious aircraft like in the days of the Schneider Trophy. Races over water then offer many race venues all over the world with the spectators lining the bank/beach and in case of emergencies the aircraft can land almost anywhere.

[shadow]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

As Thunder Engines (and later Orenda discovered), you can't just take a big aluminum V8 racing car engine and drop it into an aircraft. The unique torques and rotational vibrations induced by trying to spin a prop in varying conditions tear the bejeebers out of 'em.



We had a big discussion on this already in a Pond Racer topic.... link here:

http://www.aafo.com/hangartalk/showthread.php?t=2384&highlight=orenda

The January 1997 issue of Air & Space Smith. had a great article about this problem too, titled "POWER STRUGGLE: Wy car engines can't fly".

It's designed to turn a prop. It's a marine engine by trade. Also, you would not run this engine without a reduction gear of some sort. So, alot of the torque and vibration will be absorbed by the reduction gears. There are some very professional and talented people who can make a reduction gear to absorb 3000ftlbs.

Edit: Here's one group that could tackle the problem. Whether they would I guess is another issue. http://www.epi-eng.com/GBX_TOC.htm

As always, it's just a matter of money. At least you can stop worrying about the engine to use and concentrate on the reduction drives and other supporting systems.

[AirDOGGe]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

It's designed to turn a prop. It's a marine engine by trade. Also, you would not run this engine without a reduction gear of some sort. So, alot of the torque and vibration will be absorbed by the reduction gears.

As far as I know, ALL of the car-to-plane engine conversions use reduction gearing. Car engines are designed to produce max power at RPMs too high to direct-drive a propeller.

But I don't believe gear drives reduce these loads in any sufficent quanity to solve the damage problems. Merlins use reduction gears too, and their crankshafts still experience such vibrations (but merlins went through years of expensive development, testing and redesigns to help them withstand these aviation-related problems).

And you can't compare boats directly to aircraft. The large diameter propellers on aircraft produce rotational vibrations that are far different than those of small diameter, high RPM boat screws.

But I'm no expert on the topic in any sense (I just recite what I've read), so here's a scan of a 1-page sidebar article from the main Air & Space Smithsonian story that explains it better. You'll find it at the bottom of my post as an a downloadable image.....


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Wayne, I checked the copyright and terms of use on the Air&Space website, and it appears that this scan is permitted under their terms of FAIR USE.

Here's their own text under use of Smithsonian materials:

Smithsonian expressly prohibits the copying of any protected materials, except for the purposes of fair use as defined in the copyright law, and as described below.

Fair use:

Fair use of copyrighted material includes the use of protected materials for non-commercial educational purposes, such as teaching, scholarship, research, criticism, commentary, and news reporting.).


They go on to say that, as long as I list the source of the material and the author's name, it's permitted under these fair use circumstances.

Since this scan is being used for non-commercial comentary (and educational?) purposes, it should be OK for me to reprint it.


Here's the required info according to their terms:

Article title: POWER STRUGGLE: Wy car engines can't fly
Article source: Air & Space Smithsonian magazine, Jan. 1997
Author: Don Sherman

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if anyone is interested in reading the full Air&Space 6-page article about the evolution of the Thunder Engine/Orenda V-8 conversion for aviation use, please mention so and I'll scan and post them in this thread (if it's OK with Wayne). It's quite informative to those interested in automotive-to-aviation powerplant conversions and problems.

[64chrysler300]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

I wonder if modern airframes an modern engines would draw an Unlimited crowd.....it just wouldn't be the same for me. I go (when I can) to hear the big Radials and Merlins howl and scream around the pylons. If I want to hear a V-8 howl I'll go to a car race....If I want to hear jets....I go to work!

[Bill Marsh]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

The 40s technology is dead ...WW 2 is dead.... people!

The future is here, NOW.... we got modern planes and motors

Its called SPORT class

The ramping of the performance levels is unbeliveable and at a bargan too.

The 400 laptimes are virtually here and people are building like mad.

Sounds good to me!

BM

[AirDOGGe]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

Not to me!

The sport class is growing, but they have yet to get my heart pounding like the big boys do.

When they start making sport planes with engines that sound like a screaming pumped-up merlin or thumping big radial and start nibbling at the 500 mph wall, ask again and I may reconsider.

Until then, WWII may be long gone, but the fantastic machines that were born in that era are still alive and kicking and running better than ever!


Long live the unlimiteds!

[64chrysler300]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

Yep...Sport Class has it's place, but they aren't Unlimiteds! Two totaly separate classes, totally separate types of aircraft.

Now if you wanted to break up Sport Class into "Stock", "Modified" and "Sport Unlimited" then go for it. But the fact remains, they ain't Merlin or 3350/4360 powered. THAT's what an unlimited should have hangin off it's nose. Just my humble opinion.....

[Reno_Steve]

Re: What's going to happen in the future

It wont be long before we see people entering sports Class planes in the Unlimited races (I think the minimum weight is the only problem to this at present) and initially these planes will be slower than the Merlins etc. but not by that much.
The next step will be to modify a large sports class plane to take a Merlin engine and if all else is up to it, we should see some records tumbling.

After this the obvious step is to design a modern engine ( or copy a Merlin but use modern materials ). Hope fully we will be back where we want to be with great sounding, high performance aircraft that are replacable and can be produced in large enough numbers to gaurantee the future of the sport.