Interesting engine?

http://www.bourkeengine.com/

"dje" wrote ...
http://www.bourkeengine.com/

From the web site:
"Fuel Consumption: Russell Bourke, the inventor, claimed a brake-specific
fuel consumption (BSFC) of .25 pounds of fuel per horsepower hour."

Nothing interesting about it. He's a liar.

Rich

Opposed cylinders, Scotch yoke. Not intersting at all.

--
Geoff
the sea hawk at wow way d0t com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
Spell checking is left as an excercise for the reader.

From the web site:
"Fuel Consumption: Russell Bourke, the inventor, claimed a brake-specific
fuel consumption (BSFC) of .25 pounds of fuel per horsepower hour."
Nothing interesting about it. He's a liar.

For gasolines, that's just over 4 gallons per hour for a 100hp engine.
What's wrong w/ that? Sounds ambitious, but not crazy.

Ben Hallert
PP-ASEL

"Fuel Consumption: Russell Bourke, the inventor, claimed a
brake-specific
fuel consumption (BSFC) of .25 pounds of fuel per horsepower hour."
Nothing interesting about it. He's a liar.

For gasolines, that's just over 4 gallons per hour for a 100hp engine.
What's wrong w/ that? Sounds ambitious, but not crazy.

It violates the laws of physics. There is not that much energy in gasoline,
even if there were zero waste heat. Have you ever seen an internal
combustion engine with zero waste heat?

The best SSFC engines today are in the range of the 40's. If he could
really prove that engine was that good, he would be a billionaire right now,
not searching for investors.

People that design engines see claims like that, and chuckle while turning
the page.
--
Jim in NC

In article ,
"Morgans" wrote:

"Fuel Consumption: Russell Bourke, the inventor, claimed a
brake-specific
fuel consumption (BSFC) of .25 pounds of fuel per horsepower hour."
Nothing interesting about it. He's a liar.

For gasolines, that's just over 4 gallons per hour for a 100hp engine.
What's wrong w/ that? Sounds ambitious, but not crazy.

It violates the laws of physics. There is not that much energy in gasoline,
even if there were zero waste heat. Have you ever seen an internal
combustion engine with zero waste heat?

The best SSFC engines today are in the range of the 40's. If he could
really prove that engine was that good, he would be a billionaire right now,
not searching for investors.

People that design engines see claims like that, and chuckle while turning
the page.

The Bourque engine has been around for at least 50 years. About 30 or
more years ago, Sport Aviation published a series of articles on this
engine -- it did not live up to its claims, and, it had some mechanical
difficulties, IIRC.

There are a lot of balonium engines out there; more appear regularly,
too. Takr most claims with a healthy dose of salt (and, perhaps, a shot
of booze, too)!

--
Remve "_" from email to reply to me personally.

What's so interesting about it? It is just a two cylinder 'radial'.

Ben Hallert wrote:
Howdy,

Just for comparison, the O-200 puts out 100hp at like 5-6gph of av gas,
right? Whether or not the engine mentioned can do it, it seems
difficult to believe that the O-200 is the height of efficiency. 100hp
at 4gph doesn't seem like that far of a stretch when compared to the
burn on the O-200, I guess, especially when energy denser fuels than
avgas exist.

That said, I don't understand what the bourke engine is supposed to do
different to get the numbers it describes, like another poster
mentioned, it looks like a two cylinder rotary.

Most internal combustion engines (including the O-200) have a BSFC
between 0.4 and 0.5 pounds/hp/hour.

I'd say an O-200 puts out 100hp at about 8gph, 5-6 gph is a typical
cruise fuel flow. 100hp is at sea level, wide open throttle, max rpm.
You don't spend too much flight time in that regime.

The O-200 is not the height of efficiency, but it isn't the height of
inefficiency either. From an engineering perspective, 0.25 lb/hp/hr is,
uh, extraordinary to say the least. Think of it like the internal
combustion engine's answer to cold fusion.

Also, consider which definition of energy density you're using. Avgas,
Jet-A, and kerosene have virtually the same mass energy density (avgas
is actually about one percent greater than Jet-A). A gallon of avgas is
lighter than a gallon of kerosene (and/or jet fuel, diesel), so it's
_volumetric_ energy density is less.

Ah, gotcha! Thanks!

Regards,

Ben Hallert

"Jim Carriere" wrote in message
...
Ben Hallert wrote:
Howdy,

Just for comparison, the O-200 puts out 100hp at like 5-6gph of av gas,
right? Whether or not the engine mentioned can do it, it seems
difficult to believe that the O-200 is the height of efficiency. 100hp
at 4gph doesn't seem like that far of a stretch when compared to the
burn on the O-200, I guess, especially when energy denser fuels than
avgas exist.

That said, I don't understand what the bourke engine is supposed to do
different to get the numbers it describes, like another poster
mentioned, it looks like a two cylinder rotary.

Most internal combustion engines (including the O-200) have a BSFC
between 0.4 and 0.5 pounds/hp/hour.

I'd say an O-200 puts out 100hp at about 8gph, 5-6 gph is a typical
cruise fuel flow. 100hp is at sea level, wide open throttle, max rpm.
You don't spend too much flight time in that regime.

The O-200 is not the height of efficiency, but it isn't the height of
inefficiency either. From an engineering perspective, 0.25 lb/hp/hr is,
uh, extraordinary to say the least. Think of it like the internal
combustion engine's answer to cold fusion.

Yup. The gigiantic Sulzer marine diesels only get 0.278 lbs per hp per hour
on heavy bunker oil. That's about as good as it gets. Of course that's
1660 GPH for 108,920 hp and 5,608,312 lb/ft of torque at 102 rpm for the
I-14. Oh yes, no PSRU, the propeller is direct drive.

See: http://www.bath.ac.uk/~ccsshb/12cyl/

Bill Daniels