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Author Topic: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.  (Read 537 times)

Offline BOBO

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Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« on: September 28, 2018, 08:17:10 AM »
Jay Leno made a video demonstrating his fully functional Merlin Engine.  I thought it was pretty interesting.  I called it a motor in the title because I thought it was funny when Jeremy Clarkson made fun of Americans during an episode of Top Gear by saying "a V8 motor" using his 2nd rate fake American accent.

https://youtu.be/GYcKdK7hmEo

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Offline Mickey1992

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Re: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« Reply #1 on: October 05, 2018, 08:41:40 AM »
I love it how the cameraman almost gets blown over at 13:10.   :)
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Offline colmbo

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Re: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« Reply #2 on: October 05, 2018, 12:30:48 PM »
I was cleaning a chip detector on the B-17 during a stop in Burbank when I hear a turbine engine shutdown close to be.  Since we were off in a remote corner of the ramp I'm wondering what it was and all I see is a motorcycle with some bigheaded guy stepping off of it....it was Leno with his Allison 250 powered bike!! 

Great guy.  He ignored the fans and spent his time with the veterans.

We had the bomb bay doors off of the B-24.  Some of the rollers had cracked and those parts simply aren't available now.  Jay asked what our problem was and the mech explained.  Jay said he thought his mechanic could help and he jumped on his turbine bike and rode away.   A short time later he returns with his mechanic, they are in a Hispano - Suiza race car!!

The mechanic was able to duplicate the parts we needed and they were waiting for us a couple stops down the tour.  Good guys.
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Offline JOACH1M

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Re: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« Reply #3 on: October 10, 2018, 10:37:56 AM »
Gale banks has been doing most of the diagnosing and “tuning” on that engine. I’ve been following him as he gives a more mechanical background on working on engines like this.
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Offline zack1234

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Re: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« Reply #4 on: October 15, 2018, 11:25:58 AM »
Who is Jay Leno?
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Offline MiloMorai

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Re: Jay Leno's working Merlin Motor.
« Reply #5 on: October 15, 2018, 12:43:59 PM »
The guy standing behind the engine in the photo.
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