Corvair power?

[jonbakerok]

When I went through this exercise I concluded that the corvair was just too heavy, based on the weights I was able to find. Here's the engines I considered:

...............Ramp weight...Lost payload...HP
Lycoming O-23........250......87................118
Corvair O-164.........225......62................100
Continental O-200...215......52................100
Subaru E81............200......37................100
Jabiru 3300cc.........178......15................120
Aerovee VW...........166......3...................80
Rotax 912..............163......0...................80
Jabiru 2200cc.........132.....-31.................85

I got real excited about the Aerovee but after some research I became skeptical about the HP claims. The company wasn't interested in helping with a Kitfox installation, either. Great Plains VW might be an option, though.

Then a used Jab 2200 turned up and ended the debate.

Besides the lost payload I was worried how far forward an extra 60 pounds up front would move the CG. I once considered buying a Model 5 locally that had a Subie up front. It had a huge hunk of lead in the tail to make it balance.

[Dead Roman]

Subaru installations will never come close to as light as a corvair installation. There is a kitfox with a great plains vw flying. I think the performance is not quite as good as a 503.


also. You guys should be looking into the 0-190 which weighs it around 212 and puts out 120/hp

[Pilot4Life]

Was that 0-190 power at take-off or continuous power available?

Also, that chart that jonbakerok made up was interesting to see the side-by-side comparison, but remember that the 912s puts out 100hp on take-off and, from what I've understood, 90hp cont. The 912 listed was more than likely the original. Would be great to see some updated information. Hmm...maybe a homework project for myself? I'll do some digging and perhaps come up with an up to date side-by-side! I'll get to it soon enough! Good luck!

[Dead Roman]

110 continuous at 3000 RPM

120 Climb/peak at 3200 rpm


I think 200 rpm is a fairly arbitrary number that probably wont make a whole lot of difference in engine temps/life. Also these numbers were pulled off an engine with a very restrictive exhaust. Actual numbers are probably going to look more liek 120 continuous, 125-130ish peak.


I am in no way affiliated with william wynne or any of his work on corvair powerplants. He is confident his powerplants will be solid performers on the kitfox IV and higher airframes. I personally think spending the kind of money rotax wants for a 912 on anything other than a radial is insane. Same goes for anything produced by continental/lycoming. I feel like what William is doing with the corvair is going to be revoloutionary for homebuilding.

[tleed]

I'm with Dead Roman on the weight of the Subie E81 installations. That 200 lbs. isn't close to the final installed weight that it takes to hang that thing on the front of the airplane. I didn't make a chart as nice as jonbakerok's, but when I was working through my hp/weight research, I made certain discoveries.

First, Subie users often omit the weight of the water & radiator & other associated water-cooling apparatus necessary to get that engine on the plane. But no plane will fly w/o it, so you have to count it. And, while I've never heard of a Corvair running on the front of a Model IV, I've heard of several Subie's. Who made up the rule that Subie's can go on the front of Model IV's, but not Corvairs? But, even more curiously, I ran across several Subie's on the front of Model IV's becoming available because their owners were replacing them with something else. So perhaps a Subie really is too heavy. But, see my first note above. They're heavier, installed, than some people want you to think.

Second, the VW installations often include re-drives or mega-aggressive bore/stroke combos. That's more weight, complexity, and/or cost. That said, I looked hard at a VW, but finally went with the Corvair instead.

Third, my Corvair will be well under 225 lbs. and will develop it's max torque & hp in a relatively unstressed condition and at a relatively low rpm. It won't have any water or radiators onboard or re-drives either.

[Dead Roman]

Another bonus about corvairs is the 120hp they make is made at RPM's welll below what they were built to handle. Very smooth running engines as well. For the kind of light aircraft that most of us tend to build(i mean homebuilders as a whole) it is and absoloutley ideal powerplant. People talk about its TBO being low, it also costs less that a quarter of what it would cost to overhaul an o-200 to overhaul a corvair.

[Mnflyer]

Hi, is dual ignition available on the corvair engine? That would be the deal beaker for me, I have flown behind a VW, while it ran fine I never loked the single ignition and it was a bear to start when warm/hot and the set up I had was extremely prone to carb icing. I agree 100% that subes are not an engine for the model IV's or any Kitfox as far as I'm concerned they are too heavy.

[Dead Roman]

you can have everything except dual spark plugs i believe.

[SkyPirate]

someone that is handy with casting and knows the formula/recipee can take a corvair head and modify it for dual plugs,..getting the recipee right is the trick though.
as for dual ignition,..I have had a couple pistons melt on me ,..dual ignition didnt help me a bit ,..so dual ignition isn't a priority to me,..a good single ignition suits me fine,..just stay on top of it,..9 times out of 10 ,..a single ignition system will give you some sort of a hint that it might be on it's way out,..
and I'm not kicking redundancy just my personal preference,..
the ninja approach be. . . . . the plane ,..ha ha

Just another good reason why it's good to practice dead stick landings ,..before their is a problem

Chase

[Mnflyer]

Hi Chase, dual ignition will / has nothing to do with preventing piston melt down that would be caused by too low a fuel octane, wrong spark plug heat range or ignition timing or any combination there of. Maybe you can detect ignition failure 9 times out of 10 but iI sure can't and I have experienced mag failure a number of times and believe me had I known before takeoff that a mag was going to fail I'd replaced it before takeoff, now spark plug and ignition wiring problems even ignition timing can generally be sensed prior to total failure.

Personally from my research I think the Corvair engine maybe be a great aircraft engine with the latest mods available for it, it just needs a dual ignition mod to my way of thinking.
And being prepared for off field landings is always a must.