UK gas turbine model.
I have a Gas Turbine 12lb thrust (WRENN) and often thought about this use but the gearing problem or second turbine blade with vertical exhaust put me off!
At 125,000 rpm… reduction needed so a manageable rpm was beyond me.
Nice job they made of the model and mechanics. Uses a quart of fuel (Kerro) in apprx 10 mins
Starts running at 7.00 mins.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bxwcLX9yLE&feature=youtu.be
I saw this loco in action at Ruddington last year - it was awesome, not only for the amazing sound, but for the craftsmanship involved in its construction.
What do you use YOUR GT engine for?
tac
Ottawa Valley GRS
Ross, although the subject might best have been posted under “Locomotives” in the forums…it is a general subject of a type of motor.
My suggestion would be to have the Gas Turbine, harnessed, through a gearbox, to a small generator, with it’s output controlled through an electronic board of some sort (All using radio control), in order to power an electric locomotive, using power trucks from an appropriate manufacturer, like USTrains or Aristocraft.
If you wanted to go farther with scratch building; you might look to Micro Engineering, for one of their drive units, and develop your own power trucks.
You could go all the way, and using a second, and third unit for your locomotive, have at least one of the units as your fuel car, so that you could carry at least several quarts of fuel, for longer runs.
There was someone on this web page, a few years ago that was busy building a model of the Union Pacific Gas Turbine locomotive.He wasn’t planning on using an actual gas turbine for power, but the one you have might be useful if you really wanted a real operating model of those locomotives.
That would be quite the project. It would involve electronics too. Greg, and several others might have knowledge in the area of the generator needed, and its controls, right here on LSC.
Good luck on the project…you might have a great bit of enjoyment trying to get it running.
Fred Mills
Wow!
FRED: Sorry about the incorrect forum placement…it was placed for its entertainment value more than its mechanicals
I am too old with too little time left to tackle a major job like that! (and major is the word.) That’s a team effort!.
TAC: Used in a model of He 162 ( demolished now) - about par for model flying!
Mornin’, Ross.
That team effort, as you correctly call it, has so far cost around £120,000, possibly more.
Please post pics of your airyplane in ‘Other hobbie’ - I, for one, would love to see it.
As an aside, although I’ve never driven a real jet of any size, let alone a miniature GT-engined version, I keep my r/c these days to running trains. This is based on the dictum that when an r/c plane ‘loses it’, it eventually crashes into an often expensive smoking heap. When an r/c train loses it, it stops where you can see it, without disintegrating into an unrecognisable pile of busted bits.
Many moons ago, I worked in a unit that supported the British Army’s Drone, a little rocket-driven battlefield surveillance system called AN-USD 501 - Midge. The thing was launched from the back of a truck, dropped the booster, and then zotzed around the battlefield at a fairly low altitude, taking pics with its Zeiss cameras, themselves worth about the same as a small town. It then came home, and as it approached the LZ, cut the engine and deployed a selection of gaily-coloured chutes, landing gently in a heap much like a tired old dancer at the end of a long and exhaustive show.
What happened when the Ministers of Defence for UK, France and Germany turned up to watch was somewhat different. Fingers in ears, they watched as it took off like a space-shuttle, only more horizontally, if you follow me, dumped its non-longer-needed booster into a nearby lake [1st whoops], and lit off as an almost invisible 500 knots on its merry way - did I mention that his thing was called ‘Midge’? Just about eleven feet long? Faster than Superman? Make that invisible, then.
In the control cabin, the return signal informed the gunner [yup, it belonged to the Royal Artillery] that its numbers were up, and can it please come back with its precious cargo of film. The buttons were duly pressed, and back it came, tracked all the way by a spiffy little radar whose sole job was to keep a figurative eyeball on this VERY hard to locate and teeny missile.
About two minutes later, it passed overhead, its speed undiminished, and to everybody’s amazement plummeted at about 45 degrees into another nearby lake with an enormous KER-splash. The ministers looked at each other, then at us, and got back in their cars and drove off without saying another word apart from the one that had been on all our lips short moments before - I won’t repeat it here on this family forum, but I’m sure you can imagine it, bearing in mind the cargo of three Zeiss cameras, themselves worth about the same as a small town.
Four hours later, we all gathered around the badly-mangled wreckage, trying to figure out what had happened, and why the braking chutes had failed to, er, brake. And then, as well looked expectantly at the battered remains, there was a loud click, followed by a hiss, as the brake-chute access panel popped open, and the brake chutes deployed into the brisk breeze that had risen in the gathering dusk, rather like a tired old dancer at the end of a long and exhaustive show.
It was at that point that I decided that r/c aerial contrivances were interesting, but not interesting enough for me to become personally involved with them.
tac
Ottawa Valley GRS
The Salamander (163)was a write off after the nosewheel collapsed and it flipped. Bin liner job.
Was going to replace with the 162 but other modellers found the tailfin to be a problem in flight. Idea abandoned
All this was back in '95. Went back to N.Scale but got sidetracked starting a lighting for aeromodellers biz.
Talking of full size experiments. I was "Winkle "Brown’s dogsbody in the RN. in the mid 50s.@ Brawdy NAS.
He has testflown 475 odd aircraft.
He is still alive at 92! Charmed life I reckon(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif)
Ah well…back to modelling. Some spraypainting to do…
Mazel Tov and LeChaim to you both!
As an aside, but it was YOU that mentioned testing aircraft in the '50s, but my grandmother took me to Farnborough Air show in 1952, where we had watched in horror as John Derry and Tony Richards crashed the prototype DH110 into the crowd that we had until about ten minutes before, been part of.
tac
OVGRS
Ha and I thought someday I would want a live steam loco but a jet powered one well that’s just awesome. Love the sound of it.
Bring hearing protection =-O
tac Foley said:
I keep my r/c these days to running trains. This is based on the dictum that when an r/c plane ‘loses it’, it eventually crashes into an often expensive smoking heap. When an r/c train loses it, it stops where you can see it, without disintegrating into an unrecognizable pile of busted bits.
It was a similar tradeoff when I switched to trains, from doing rocket aerial photography as my primary hobby. Not only do my trains tend to stay largely intact when they fail, they also stay on or near the tracks. No need to traipse across the desert searching for them!
Ray you just gave me an idea. We have a Jet powered train. But what about a rocket powered train. I can see putting an f rocket motor in the back and hit the switch(http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-innocent.gif)
Rockets are inherently uncontrollable. You light 'em up, stand back and watch the literal fireworks. They go like crazy, then fizzle out…and that’s it.
At least with a gas-turbine you CAN control the throttle, else we would not have had GT locomotives in the fust place. Here in UK, the Rover Car Company even built a few GT-powered sports cars…
How gorgeous is THAT?
There WAS a downside, though. 2.3 miles per gallon, and that’s a UK/Imperial gallon, not one of your ‘short-change metric’ US gallons…
tac
Ottawa Valley GRS
