Assistance with turbojet engine research

[pfx]

Sad thing is, I don't think kids leave high school with a. the maturity and b. the direction to know what to take as a next step. I reckon the pressure is on from parents/peers/society to head to uni when this is not perhaps the best step. It wasn't for me, I left in 2nd year having decided it just wasn't what I wanted. Fortunately there was nothing quite as worrying as a draft to avoid so I got myself into the workplace until I was almost 30 and decided I'd travel then.

Spent a year in New Zealand, 2 in Ireland (okay, it's not that far away) and finally back home only to return to Ireland a few years ago. It certainly worked for me, though I dearly wish I'd stayed in NZ. The only downside is that I've never really had a career as such as I've moved around so much it's meant leaving places when things were looking promising. Damn those itchy feet.

 

[peghorse]

Fascinating insights Bendorsey thank you. I spent quite some time doing heat runs etc on underground longwall mining equipment builds at 3am in the mornings which was genuinely good fun, albeit not very complex machinery compared to P&W's work. (apart from the optical gyros of course - which mere grunts or sparkies didn't have a lot to do with).

Your keen-ness for knowledge is infectious LNERlover5, thank you for sharing your enthusiasm.
Here's some top secret, ultra high tech, jet engine related data for you!
When I was about 12 I attempted to make a ram jet engine from a soft drink can, model aircraft fuel and a house fan. I lovingly coaxed the can into the appropriate shape. fitted the gravity fuel supply hose, and modelled a 12 volt manually triggered sparking system using the Triang/Hornby 12volt Dcc from our train set and tried to let her rip. The results were less than encouraging and the company budget, (meagre pocket money), ran dry, forcing me to also retire from my illustrious future carreer as a producer of Jet engines Gawd it was great fun though! No internet or anything back then, books from the library were my primary source of information.

 

[pfx]

Haha. Cracking! Sounds like me when I used to try and create explosions using a kid's chemistry set or my experiments using a model steam engine. Lord only knows how I didn't actually blow myself up...

 

[LNERlover5]

Reminds me of running my nitro-methane RC car when i was roughly 10 years old! The engine simply went boom after plenty of runs at 35+ MPH! Not cheap to run, but it was worth it!

 

[bendorsey]

Gigantic V-8 engines in dragsters here often use nitro-methane but as I understand it, mixing it is more of an art form then chemistry. I've read its mixed at the last minutes and the ratio must take temperature, humidty, and possibly atmospheric pressure into account for the best mix.

Craziest thing I ever did was scratch build/kit-bash) an On3 2-6-6-2 using Kemtron C-16 parts. It actually turned out rather good but wasn't prototype of course. I might even still have it as I have 2 boxes of my old O/On3 stuff (somewhere in this barn of a house, lol).

Ben

 

[peghorse]

Lmao what a cool thread. Another amaaaazing invention of mine was a steam powered roller skate ;o
It had a little donkey engine on top of it and drove one wheel with a rubber band.
What good is a single steam powered roller skate with no room for a foot or shoe? dunnooo.. but it was pretty funky :udrool:

And yes Bendorsey, top fuel drag racing category is awesome fun. I do love the v-twin top fuel bikes the most. They refer to them as Harleys
but there aint nothin HD about them. When manually purging the huge cylinders in the pits, the noise they make is like giant dinosaurs waking.
And because of the inherant balance problems with V2's of that angle, when they let go at high revs/full throttle, red hot bits go everywhere.

 

[bendorsey]

Hi Peghorse:

I've owned 2 Boss Hoss motorcycles. First had a 350 cu in V-8 - second had a 502 cu in V-8. I went to the national convention one year and saw 2 with 615 cu in Donovan racing V-8s in them. Then there was the totally insane bike with a 565 cu in Hemi, two 1150 cfm holly carbs, and a gigantic blower on top of that. 1500 HP without nitrous oxide. All of these are 2-wheel bikes - not trikes (tho Boss Hoss does make a trike). My current bike is an Ecstasy (renegade) trike with a 350 cu in V-8 in it. I live in south Florida yet I've driven it to upper Michigan (twice), Sturgis, SD, Durango, CO, etc. Rode the 502 to the rallies in Myrtle Beach, SC, and Laconia, NH. Lotta fun but a very heavy bike (1800 pounds with a full tank and me on it). Sold it to a gent in Berlin, Germany a few months ago. He is happy as a clam since there are only 3 Boss Hoss bikes in Germany and he has the only 502. Must be fun on the autobahn, lol. They are no longer offering it with the 502. Instead they are putting the new Corvette motor in it. 17 HP less but also 200 pounds less (for around $48,000).

Ben