Speaking of loud pipes .B29 content

[oldbike54]

 FiFi , the only flying example of the B29 flew right over my house about 10:00 this morning , followed by an F4U Corsair .The sound of those Wright 3350s is amazing . They are in town for an event this week . Sorry , no pics , but we know what a B29 looks like anyway 

  Dusty

[F-Man]

FIFI is a beautiful airplane and its Wright R-3350 engines sound fantastic. I was around it last summer at an airshow at Mather Field in Sacramento.

I spent this past weekend at the National Championship Air Races here in Reno.  Lots of wonderful sights of beautiful airplanes and equally wonderful music from Merlins, R4360s, R1340s, etc. going at full-tilt.  The jet class also sounds great . . . mostly Aero L-29 and L-39 jets, but this year there was also a wonderful DeHavilland DH-115 Vampire, which won the jet gold class.

[Gliderjohn]

Fifi is going to have a brother, "Doc". This has been a 15 year project at in Wichita. Just had a successful engine startups. See it on the video below:
http://www.b-29doc.com/2015/09/19/docs-engines-roar-to-life-video-replay/

GliderJohn

[AMGeneral]

Anyone else cheer when number two finally started? What a plane! I cheered along, the pride those folks must have after all that hard work to restore Doc from a relic in the desert.

[oldbike54]

Anyone else cheer when number two finally started? What a plane! I cheered along, the pride those folks must have after all that hard work to restore Doc from a relic in the desert.

 Yeah , that was cool . The flip side was the B29  in Greenland that caught fire and was destroyed after a crew had got it flight worthy .

 Dusty
 

[Triple Jim]

Yeah , that was cool . The flip side was the B29  in Greenland that caught fire and was destroyed after a crew had got it flight worthy .

Well, not quite flight worthy, since they forgot to bolt down the little 2-stroke generator near the tail.  What an anticlimax, watching that whole PBS presentation.   

[oldbike54]

Well, not quite flight worthy, since they forgot to bolt down the little 2-stroke generator near the tail.  What an anticlimax, watching that whole PBS presentation.   

 Kirby 1923 is friends with those guys , they should have checked the fire suppression system .

  Dusty

[Rough Edge racing]

 Superfortress  by General Lemay is an excellent book on the B-29 operations and raids over Japan. Lemay was the commander and has lots to say about the troublesome Wright 3350's. The engines were prone to overheating and seizure during the takeoff and climb to altitude. Lemay said the engine would seize and the prop wouldn't feather and it would freewheel out of control. If you were lucky the prop would fly off and maybe not tear into the aircraft. If you were unlucky the prop would seize and tear the complete engine from the wing......B-29 missions were hazardous to say the least and overall the B-29 program cost more than the Manhattan A bomb project.

[John A]

As nice as they sound they are throttled way back on 100 low lead, think how they sound wound up on 140 octane!

[Two Checks]

It wasn't the design of the engines that was problematic by the time LeMay was in charge. The design requirements set for the aircraft by the Army made for poor coling ofthe engines. Plus, weight requirements made the use of magnesium castings a must. As you know magnesium burns vrey hot and resulted in many fires.
Chrysler used the engines as stationary generators and used this as dyno tests. They produced a lot of the electricity used in the plant.
You can read more about it here:

 http://www.allpar.com/history/military/b-29.html

[steven c]

 Yesterday while siting at my desk I hear that unmistakable sound of radial engine, I jump up look outside the window and a B25 is flying over! Nothing going on around here in CT. Just passing by. Love seeing those old war birds.

[Rough Edge racing]

It wasn't the design of the engines that was problematic by the time LeMay was in charge. The design requirements set for the aircraft by the Army made for poor coling ofthe engines. Plus, weight requirements made the use of magnesium castings a must. As you know magnesium burns vrey hot and resulted in many fires.
Chrysler used the engines as stationary generators and used this as dyno tests. They produced a lot of the electricity used in the plant.
You can read more about it here:

 http://www.allpar.com/history/military/b-29.html

 Yes, the engine installation was a problem but during the B-29 development the 3350 had many issues . The cooling issue was somewhat resolved with the  introduction of fuel injection that eliminated some cylinders running lean...

[oldbike54]

 One of the issues was that the 3350s were running dual stage forced induction , plus the rear cylinders didn't receive enough cooling air . Flight engineers on the B29 had their hands full during bombing runs .


  Dusty

[Rough Edge racing]

One of the issues was that the 3350s were running dual stage forced induction , plus the rear cylinders didn't receive enough cooling air . Flight engineers on the B29 had their hands full during bombing runs .


  Dusty

 On top of that the engineers had to keep the fuel mixture a bit rich for cylinder head cooling so fuel usage was more than estimated...The B-17 and B-24 also had dual stage supercharging... Turbo super charger to keep the air close to sea level pressure and then a mechanical supercharger for the boost need for HP rating....The B-29 differed in having dual turbochargers per engine. It was a very complicated aircraft for it's time....And it did bring the Japanese to surrender.

[Two Checks]

If you read the info at the link it explains how Chrysler overcame the design problems with the over 6,000 running design changes that were allowed.  Wright incorporated the changes in the engines they built.

[M0T0Geezer]

Here are some pix of a B-17 and a B-24 I took a few  years ago when they flew into Loveland Colorado

http://dansher.com/wwar2/b17/b17_jul05.html

[Gliderjohn]

There was an updated article today. Sorry that I cannot print a link, have to be a subscriber. It stated that the average fuel consumption will be 500 gallons an hour. Ouch! Now think for a moment, this usage is with very conservative running conditions. During WWII some missions had over 400 B-29s using all available power as needed. All that fuel had to be shipped or in case of the China based planes, flown in. Now that would have been a fuel bill!
GliderJohn

[Murray]

There was an updated article today. Sorry that I cannot print a link, have to be a subscriber. It stated that the average fuel consumption will be 500 gallons an hour. Ouch! Now think for a moment, this usage is with very conservative running conditions.

In contrast the Allison Turbine rated at around 5500 hp as Used in C130's and P3c's etc burns 1000lbs per hour per engine 149ish US gallons an Hour, just shy of 600gallons an hour. Double the output light faster more reliable less fussy about fuel grade less complicated to operate, why did they go away from radials again?