Bristol Beaufighter

[nrshida]

Little bit more information on the Bristol sleeve valve series of engines.


A brief explanation of the operation:-


Starting with the crankcase to show the reason for that large quantity of gears arranged around the centreline. The outer race of gears rotate at half the revolutions of the engine:



The purpose of these is to drive a tiny crank which operates an individual sleeve valve. Here in this cutaway drawing the individual cranks can be seen. The short shafted ones serve the front bank of cylinders and the long the back:



Since each valve and cylinder is identical regardless of orientation it is best just to focus on one. Here you see a single cylinder and its corresponding sleeve valve:



One set of the cylinder's exhaust ports can be seen on the left side and one intake on the right. Air is fed to this directly from the supercharger. There are two of each. The sleeve valve itself has two important features, the ports, which I will come back to later, and the valve drive mechanism, which is that little ball-like receptacle shown in the foreground. In this image of a cutaway engine, the proper position of those parts can be seen:



In the bottom left quadrant of the image you can see the little crank, driven by one of those numerous gears, connected to the ball mechanism. As this crank rotates (at half engine revolutions) it propels the sleeve valve both a up and down and in a reciprocating rotation motion. 

Now hopefully this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Liqqo8Cdb68

Makes some more sense. I think the cutaway they did on the sleeve valve is a little misleading, but the innermost thing is the piston, outside of that and moving slower up and down and also rotating is the sleeve valve, outside of that is the cylinder itself in which an outer port can be seen. When the ports of the sleeve valve align with the cylinder port then obviously that 'valve' is open.

In this diagram the shapes of inner and outer ports can be seen:



About one third from the left in each row a small dashed oval-shaped arrow can be seen which indicates the motion of the valve. Up and down with the piston as well as rotating. S indicates sleeve and C indicates cylinder. If you printed the page out and rolled it into a sleeve then you have it.


Finally a few relevant pages from a manual:-











Hope this helps stoke up some enthusiasm for your wish. Please support our Westland Whirlwind thread also:

http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,313538.0.html

 

[lyric1]

 

[Hajo]

Interesting info....Bristol started by making carriages, then made automobiles, then aircraft.

[LCADolby]

It's looks like it's a very hefty engine.

[Fish42]

 



Nice looking blue skin!

[TOMCAT21]

looks snappy....

[Butcher]

Beaufighter would be a poor mans 410..

I'd still vote for it, served its time and did quite well on all fronts.

Besides Australia needs a fighter

[Karnak]

Beaufighter would be a poor mans 410..

I'd still vote for it, served its time and did quite well on all fronts.

Besides Australia needs a fighter

Well, probably more agile and definitely tougher.  Slower too.

[bozon]

Beaufighter would be a poor mans 410..

I'd still vote for it, served its time and did quite well on all fronts.

Besides Australia needs a fighter

The Beau unlike the 410 will be enabled in all arenas. Very useful in many scenarios, much more than the 410.

I always wondered how useful was the observer. I mean, he can barely see anything out of that tiny bubble, he has no gun (well, he can carry a pistol to shoot himself) and unlike in the mossie, he can only communicate with his pilot through the intercom. He sits so far back - did they have to replace him with a sack of potatoes for balance, should the plane take off without him?
More to the point: what were his responsibilities? navigation? special equipment operation?

[titanic3]

Hmmm..visibility out of the cockpit looks like poo. I wonder if they added F3 (to represent the observer), if that would make this thing even more used. Or just disable firing while in F3.

My 2 cents.

[Karnak]

Hmmm..visibility out of the cockpit looks like poo. I wonder if they added F3 (to represent the observer), if that would make this thing even more used. Or just disable firing while in F3.

My 2 cents.

Rear visibility sure, but forward visibility looks perhaps better than anything currently in AH.

[Butcher]

Well, probably more agile and definitely tougher.  Slower too.

Not so sure it would be more agile, its engines were pretty weak compare to 410 - there would be no acceleration - I wonder if someone has the wing loading data and weight of it empty?

[Karnak]

Based on Wikipedia's numbers for the Beaufighter TP.Mk X:

Empty: 30.998lb/sq.ft
Max loaded: 50.497lbs/sq.ft

503sq.ft wing area
15592lbs empty
25400lbs max load

[Masherbrum]

Beaufighter would be a poor mans 410..

I'd still vote for it, served its time and did quite well on all fronts.

Besides Australia needs a fighter

The Beaufighter is more balanced plane than the POS 410 that this Community begged for.   Definitely more agile than the anemic 410.    It also would have filled a much needed gap sooner, than the 410.  

[Butcher]

The Beaufighter is more balanced plane than the POS 410 that this Community begged for.   Definitely more agile than the anemic 410.    It also would have filled a much needed gap sooner, than the 410.  

Problem was look at the choices - Meteor? Yak? Me-410?

Personally was hoping the Beaufighter/410 were in the last rounds but it simply didn't get enough votes.

I actually figured the Meteor was going to win, after all ZOMG!! JET!!! Considering the B-29 was voted in over other aircrafts like the He-111, I assumed the meteor was going to win simply because it was a jet.