From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Page 2 of a memorandum discussing engine weight, fly-wheel issues, vibrations, and piston design.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 127\4\ scan0186 | |
| Date | 8th March 1940 | |
| - 2 - Rm.{William Robotham - Chief Engineer}4/ML.8.3.40. This weight seems on the light side, considering the engine is entirely cast-iron, and Taub's cylinder head is notoriously heavy. However, we suspect that the figure may be optimistic. He told us one interesting point, that they could never get fly-wheels to burst unless they slipped the clutch and heated up the fly-wheel before running it up to high speeds. Taub is now controlling the oil thrown on the cylinder bores by the bottom of the piston skirt, a procedure which he/previously maintained was entirely wrong. He found that a lot of his vibrations on the 4-cylinder engine were due to fly-wheel vibration. He said a lot of funny things about sparking plugs, but none of them contributed to our current problems. He is using a long-reach plug, but you will see from Salt's remarks that it's virtues are doubtful. He showed me a piston which B.H.P. had produced, which has a split skirt with wire wound round the bottom and suggests that this enables a very close-fitting round aluminium piston to be used. It is very difficult to see what advantage one would get over the normal split skirt piston. - Continued - | ||