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).
The causes of engine failures, focusing on bearings, split pins, and oil feed systems.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 179b\3\ img079 | |
| Date | 30th January 1933 | |
| -3- Ha.7/MJ.30.1.33. Cont'd.{John DeLooze - Company Secretary} We do not expect to find one clear cut cause of these failures, we very seldom have this fortune. It is usually a combination of conditions which causes the failure. Our records show that the front end of the engine is worse on bearings. It is also a fact that cases of split pins failing always occur on the front end, and even on those which have not failed the wear on the split pins is also more on the front end. Another point we have got to look into is that the present feed for the big end bearings is an intermittent feed, i.e. there are three holes in the crankshaft and two in the bearing so that the bearing is supplied by six squirts/rev. A number of our engines have had a continuous supply to the big end bearing. We have run several Type Tests on Kestrels with this arrangement and it may be wise to revert to it so that the oil pressure in the manifold will more quickly get to the big end bearing. Ha. | ||