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).
Technical report discussing a fuel system's operation and the potential use of an oil pump for the Phantom engine.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 40\3\ Scan039 | |
| Date | 7th October 1925 | |
| Oy1-E-10725 -5- October 7th, 1925. bell around the float until it pushes back the fuel in leg J' of the syphon, the fuel therefore at this stage rises higher inside than outside the diving bell. When the fuel is pushed out of J' to the condition shown in figure 2, it escapes through the fuel in the cup. Float rises suddenly opening needle valve X. Atmospheric pressure in lower tank pushes air through needle valve and up the stand pipe until the pressure falls sufficiently in the top tank to allow float to open the big valve Y, when the fuel is dumped into the lower tank as shown in Figure 3. When the fuel falls to the level of Figure 1 the liquid seal on the bottom of the diving bell is broken and the float falls closing both valves. One can see that this system can only be used with a limited suction device. If used with the large suction capacity of an intake pipe connection, when the needle valve X opened the violent bubbling with such a fierce vacuum connection would feed lots of rich mixture into the in-take pipe. It seems therefore that an air pump or the makers' little vane type oil pump would have to be used with this system. Their arguments for the vane pump are given on page 9 of the larger book-let. It is rather difficult to imagine us using it except as an auxiliary, feeding oil to the timing gears and rocker-shaft say. The makers require particulars of the proposed spindle-ends which we may think are accessible for driving their oil pump. The speed of the spindle defines the size of pump they would recommend, but they have no objection to spindles running up to 1-1/2 engine speed (say 3360 revolutions per mile). Pumps vary from 1-1/8" to about 2-1/2" diameter of rotor. I did not go into this matter deeply because I thought you would object to the type of pump, or would want to apply it to the Phantom engine with which we are not very familiar yet. I did not want to show Kemp any Phantom drawings just now, because of starting rumors in the trade. | ||