{"id":3067,"date":"2012-01-24T23:10:32","date_gmt":"2012-01-24T23:10:32","guid":{"rendered":"\/?p=3067"},"modified":"2016-12-30T10:24:56","modified_gmt":"2016-12-30T15:24:56","slug":"benoist-and-roberts-engine-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/kermit-weeks\/benoist-and-roberts-engine-update\/","title":{"rendered":"Benoist and Roberts Engine Update!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Progress continues to be made on the Benoist airplane we are building at Fantasy of Flight for the 100th Anniversary of the first scheduled commercial airplane flight on 1\/1\/2014.<\/p>\n<p>Restoration specialist, Ken Kellett, is heading up the construction of the airframe and has begun making jigs for the fuselage sides, ribs, and a mock-up of the center-section to get an idea of where everything will go.<\/p>\n<p>Most people that reproduce old airplanes only go half the distance to do it right and end up installing a modern engine and don&#8217;t get near the same performace as the original. \u00a0This is because of the rpm the engine delivers it&#8217;s horsepower and turns the propellor. \u00a0Most modern engines turn at a higher rpm for use with smaller propellors at higher speeds. \u00a0At the speed realm of the older airplanes, modern engines cannot create the thrust needed like a slow moving large diameter propellor.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s not the way we like to do things. \u00a0However, there was a problem . . . we couldn&#8217;t find an engine to purchase ANYWHERE!<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3075\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 580px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-3075 size-full colorbox-3067\" title=\"Crankshaft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Crankshaft.jpg\" width=\"580\" height=\"410\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">There&#8217;s a Crankshaft in there somewhere!<\/p><\/div>\n<p>I hired Steve Littin of Vintage Auto and Rebuilds in Ohio to scratch build the six-cylinder Roberts engine that we&#8217;ll need for the project.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3072\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 510px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-3072 size-full colorbox-3067\" title=\"Cylinder and mold plug\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Cylinder-and-mold-plug1.jpg\" width=\"510\" height=\"477\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">An original cylinder and a mold plug<\/p><\/div>\n<p>His company currently builds Rolls Royce Silver Ghost car engines from scratch of the same period and is well-qualified to do the job. \u00a0I was able to purchase two four-cylinder Roberts engines but only know of about six original engines that were in museums and unavailable for purchase.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3073\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 554px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-3073 size-full colorbox-3067\" title=\"Cylinder molds\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Cylinder-molds.jpg\" width=\"554\" height=\"410\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cylinder Molds<\/p><\/div>\n<p>We were able to borrow a six-cylinder Roberts that had been in a crash from Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome to reverse-engineer. \u00a0The four-cylinder engines that I have put out 50 hp. \u00a0The Benoist uses a six-cylinder Roberts that is basically a stretched four-cylinder to produce 75 hp. \u00a0The cylinders and carburetors are identical and the plan is to build the case molds for both the four and six-cylinder engines.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3074\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 579px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-3074 size-full colorbox-3067\" title=\"Connecting rods\" src=\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Connecting-rods.jpg\" width=\"579\" height=\"528\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Roughed in Connecting Rods!<\/p><\/div>\n<p>It&#8217;s an exciting project for everyone. \u00a0We&#8217;re living our product by <em>pushing our boundaries.<\/em> It will be great to see how all this unfolds!<\/p>\n<p>Kermit<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Progress continues to be made on the Benoist airplane we are building at Fantasy of Flight for the 100th Anniversary of the first scheduled commercial airplane flight on 1\/1\/2014. Restoration specialist, Ken Kellett, is heading\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,31,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-benoist","category-calendar-events","category-kermit-weeks","benoist-and-roberts-engine-update"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3067"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6001,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067\/revisions\/6001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}