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).
Test report on producing scuffed pistons and the effectiveness of different oils and tin-plating.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 107\2\ scan0175 | |
| Date | 5th April 1938 | |
| -2- (2) Adopt tin-plated pistons as an extra safeguard. METHOD OF TEST. To produce scuffed pistons we did not have to resort to any unusual tests, the procedure being as follows :- (1) Build up engine in normal way and smearing piston skirts and cylinder walls with which ever oil was to be used for the test. (2) Start up and run at approx. 350 - 400 r.p.m. light for 30 minutes for warming up purposes. (3) After 30 minutes warming up run at 1500 r.p.m. light for 3 hours. The attached photographs show clearly the results obtained from our tests. We have no photographs of pistons run on Castor oil but we know from the results of the engine used on 15,000 miles test that Castor oil is an effective safeguard as this engine had previously given trouble and we had at the time to use Castor oil in order to get the engine off test. We have examined engines off production chassis which are, of course, run on De Laval oil and the pistons showed no signs of scuffing, our own tests confirm this as shown by the photographs. Photograph (5) shows that after running for 7 hours on De Laval oil no scuffing took place when the engine was subsequently run on Mobiloil Arctic oil. RM{William Robotham - Chief Engineer}/mths.{Reg Matthews} | ||