Three Gallons Per Hour

Aero News has a story today about Indus Aviation flying a diesel
Thorpedo burning only three gallons of Jet-A per hour. It uses a
WAM-120 turbocharged three-cylinder diesel engine generating 120
horsepower. One drawback of the engine - the installed weight is 279
pounds. But on the plus side it uses a mechanical control unit rather
than electronic. The "projected" TBO is 3000 hours.

Phil

Phil J wrote in news:748b4d47-77dc-49a8-8252-
:

Aero News has a story today about Indus Aviation flying a diesel
Thorpedo burning only three gallons of Jet-A per hour. It uses a
WAM-120 turbocharged three-cylinder diesel engine generating 120
horsepower. One drawback of the engine - the installed weight is 279
pounds. But on the plus side it uses a mechanical control unit rather
than electronic. The "projected" TBO is 3000 hours.

Phil


Last I heard of that one it was more like 4-5 GPH. That might be an
Imperial measurement.


Bertie

Hmmm, My BS meter is twitching...This is a BSFC of ~0.142

The very best diesel BSFC is the huge japanese engines used in
container ships at roughly 0.30...

denny

On Apr 13, 12:29 pm, Denny wrote:
Hmmm, My BS meter is twitching...This is a BSFC of ~0.142

The very best diesel BSFC is the huge japanese engines used in
container ships at roughly 0.30...

denny


How did you get SFC of 0.142?

That 3gph might be based on say 50% power (60HP is plenty for cruise
flight on a LSA on a local sight-seeing trip). That'll make SFC: 3 *
6.8 / 60 = 0.34 lb-hr/HP. That's quite doable on a diesel.

On Apr 13, 2:10*pm, Bertie the Bunyip wrote:
Phil J wrote in news:748b4d47-77dc-49a8-8252-
:

Aero News has a story today about Indus Aviation flying a diesel
Thorpedo burning only three gallons of Jet-A per hour. *It uses a
WAM-120 turbocharged three-cylinder diesel engine generating 120
horsepower. *One drawback of the engine - the installed weight is 279
pounds. *But on the plus side it uses a mechanical control unit rather
than electronic. *The "projected" TBO is 3000 hours.

Phil

Last I heard of that one it was more like 4-5 GPH. That might be an
Imperial measurement.

Bertie

Indus claimed three gallons per hour for a flight from Dallas, Texas
to Lakeland, Florida. I would guess that they throttled back to the
leanest possible cruise. In an EAA news article they are claiming 3.5
to 4 gallons per hour ( http://www.eaa.org/news/2008/2008-04-12_indus.asp
).

Phil

The very best diesel BSFC is the huge japanese engines used in
container ships at roughly 0.30...


BTW, SFC 0.30 is achievable on mid-size ship diesel. The largest ship
diesel engines can do 0.28 lb-hr/HP or less:

http://people.bath.ac.uk/ccsshb/12cyl/

On Apr 13, 4:13 pm, Phil J wrote:


Indus claimed three gallons per hour for a flight from Dallas, Texas
to Lakeland, Florida. I would guess that they throttled back to the
leanest possible cruise.

No doubt that 3gph figure must be an economic cruise power setting,
likely below 50% power.

BTW on a diesel, the combustion is well lean of stoichiometric even at
the max rated power. The air intake is not throttle and the
"throttle" control in a diesel engine is the fuel flow control.
There's no such thing as lean of peak or best power mixture :-) You
reduce the fuel flow and the engine produces less power. You increase
the fuel flow and the engine produces more power - until you reach the
soot limit or other thermo/mechanical limit for the particular engine
and that's the max rated power.

Denny wrote in news:b71e5ad0-64ee-483e-8102-
:

Hmmm, My BS meter is twitching...This is a BSFC of ~0.142

The very best diesel BSFC is the huge japanese engines used in
container ships at roughly 0.30...

denny


Well, here they're saying somethign quite different

http://www.wilksch.com/wam-120.html

The 3 GPH might not have been at econ cruise, but it was probably at max
endurance, i.e., just enough to keep them aloft.



Bertie

"Bertie the Bunyip" wrote in message
...
Denny wrote in news:b71e5ad0-64ee-483e-8102-
:

Hmmm, My BS meter is twitching...This is a BSFC of ~0.142

The very best diesel BSFC is the huge japanese engines used in
container ships at roughly 0.30...

denny


Well, here they're saying somethign quite different

http://www.wilksch.com/wam-120.html

The 3 GPH might not have been at econ cruise, but it was probably at max
endurance, i.e., just enough to keep them aloft.



Bertie

And the Wilksch Airmotive numbers for specific fuel consumption are
resoundingly unimpressive for a diesel. It sure is light though!

Peter

On Apr 13, 6:21*pm, M wrote:
On Apr 13, 4:13 pm, Phil J wrote:



Indus claimed three gallons per hour for a flight from Dallas, Texas
to Lakeland, Florida. *I would guess that they throttled back to the
leanest possible cruise.

No doubt that 3gph figure must be an economic cruise power setting,
likely below 50% power.

BTW on a diesel, the combustion is well lean of stoichiometric even at
the max rated power. *The air intake is not throttle and the
"throttle" control in a diesel engine is the fuel flow control.
There's no such thing as lean of peak or best power mixture :-) *You
reduce the fuel flow and the engine produces less power. *You increase
the fuel flow and the engine produces more power - until you reach the
soot limit or other thermo/mechanical limit for the particular engine
and that's the max rated power.

See this is what I like about this newsgroup. I am always learning
something new. I've never had direct experience with a diesel engine,
although I suspect that there are going to be more of them in cars as
American fuel prices rise.

Phil