Your most unliked engine , petrol, glowor diesel.

[flying daddy]

With out a shadow of a doubt my favourite engine is any Laser engine .I am still in mourning of it's dismise

😪😪😪😪 RIP.Laser

[PatMc]

8 hours ago, flying daddy said:

With out a shadow of a doubt my favourite engine is any Laser engine .I am still in mourning of it's dismise

😪😪😪😪 RIP.Laser

I think you've picked the wrong thread 🤣

[flying daddy]

With out a shadow of a doubt my favourite engine is any Laser engine .I am still in mourning of it's dismise

😪😪😪😪 RIP.Laser

Doh !!!!

[Martin McIntosh]

Flicking through the replies I see the Bantam cropping up. Got one for Christmas when I was aged 11, along with a c/l Spitfire. Never could get it to start. My mate faired better with a Mills 0.75 powered KK Champ so we taught ourselves to fly using that.

I later cobbled together a Cardinal and an experienced modeller saw me struggling to start it and got the thing going. One and only flight saw it end up in a lake where it spent two hours drifting across. Swapped the thing for an Elfin 2.49. Good riddance!

 

[Robin Colbourne]

On 17/10/2024 at 10:32, Martin McIntosh said:

Flicking through the replies I see the Bantam cropping up. Got one for Christmas when I was aged 11, along with a c/l Spitfire. Never could get it to start. My mate faired better with a Mills 0.75 powered KK Champ so we taught ourselves to fly using that.

I later cobbled together a Cardinal and an experienced modeller saw me struggling to start it and got the thing going. One and only flight saw it end up in a lake where it spent two hours drifting across. Swapped the thing for an Elfin 2.49. Good riddance!

 

Martin, you offloaded a DC Bantam in return for an Elfin 2.49?  Do you still feel the pangs of guilt for doing that to the poor recipient?  🤣

With regard to your aquatic adventure, my Ebenezer flying friend still recounts how, one frosty Christmas Day afternoon, his Ebenezer Fokker D7 landed in the middle of Frensham Great Pond.  My father went home, collected our small inflatable dinghy, and paddled out as it was getting dark to retrieve the thing.   Maybe Bantams have an affinity to water?

[Doug Campbell]

My first new engine was a DC Bantam, chosen in preference to a Dart.  The Bantam was ran regularly in the back garden, then successfully flew free flight and control  line models in the school grounds. I now own a few of them and although not very powerful,  they all run well and start easily so I am surprised at their poor reputation

The word engines I have owned must be the ED Pep and the Clan 0.25. Neither capable of running

[Martin McIntosh]

No pangs at all. It was an early Elfin and a bit battered but at least it started OK. I later obtained one of a later mk and it was the most benign diesel I ever owned.

[Engine Doctor]

14 hours ago, Doug Campbell said:

 

The word engines I have owned must be the ED Pep and the Clan 0.25. Neither capable of running

Wasnt the ED Pep a rebadged Webra ? They didnt really catch on did they ?

The Clan , I think was commission by Mike Clanford and was very variable, some ran   many didnt . Even if the did run they couldnt hold full power for long . I think they were made by CS as were  DB's Boddo Mills that often self destructed when in storage as the crankcase would split open due to the rubbish materials CS used. 

Edited October 19 by Engine Doctor

[Robin Colbourne]

2 hours ago, Engine Doctor said:

Wasnt the ED Pep a rebadged Webra ? They didnt really catch on did they ?

The Clan , I think was commission by Mike Clanford and was very variable, some ran   many didnt . Even if the did run they couldnt hold full power for long . I think they were made by CS as were  DB's Boddo Mills that often self destructed when in storage as the crankcase would split open due to the rubbish materials CS used. 

That is really quite an achievement to make an engine that self destructs in the box.  Was it magnesium in some sort of corrosive packaging?

[Engine Doctor]

No it was some sort of alloy that melted at a lower temp than low temp alloy brazing rods. Engine was in  perfect condition when packed away in its box. About a year later I took it out and found the crank case had split the length of the shaft ! When I tried to buy a case they were unavailable and CS had shut down. I contacted model engine news who said it was a common problem and they had 100 made that instantly sold out. My only solution was to make one . See pics from melted case to the finished item . I Annodised it green to make it unique .

[J D 8 - Moderator]

Cox Medallion 09. I have run many a Cox engine just fine, my own and friends but not this one. Purchased many moons ago to go on a wing seat power pod for Flair Fledgling glider. Cox at this time 80's/90's finally started to think of limiting the wonderful/horrendous depending on your point of view exhaust note. Came with an exhaust collector ring, muffler, supposed throttle which is just an exhaust restrictor. 

  Just nowhere near enough power for glider[even without muffler] where as PAW of same size hauled it up and away. The collector did work well as a muffler provided the black spring clip you can see in pic was in place covering the outlet springing out just enough to release the exhaust pulse each stroke. However this just killed the power. A circlip at the base of collector linked to a rod to rotate it and restrict the exhaust. As a throttle it is rubbish, will reduce revs some or act as a cut out. 

 In the test stand today, had in the end use electric starter, my finger got tired/bored.😁 

 Next engine on the stand a little gem but that is for the other thread.

[J D 8 - Moderator]

 A later version was made with with a barrel restrictor linked to a ventury throttle. Don't know if this was any better.

[brokenenglish]

8 hours ago, Engine Doctor said:

Wasnt the ED Pep a rebadged Webra ? They didnt really catch on did they ?

The Clan , I think was commission by Mike Clanford and was very variable, some ran   many didnt . Even if the did run they couldnt hold full power for long . I think they were made by CS as were  DB's Boddo Mills that often self destructed when in storage as the crankcase would split open due to the rubbish materials CS used. 

No Robin, the ED engine made by Webra was the 1.5cc ED Hawk (very similar to the Webra Rekord).
I see the ED Pep being criticised, but I've had 3 or 4 through my hands and they've all been excellent runners.
The common feature between the Pep and the Hawk is that neither was actually made by ED. The Pep was actually made by an ED sub-contractor in Brentford High Street and was subsequently transformed to become the ZA 92.

 

[Tom Gaskin 1]

Oh goodness - the ZA92!

That was the first motor that my Dad bought me when I started to show interest in models. We could never get it to run reliably and it was never installed in a model. It finally got thrown away!

 

Tom

[Rich Griff]

Hi Jd8,

As a matter of interest, did the medalion red intake manifold have a short fuel pipe sized stub on the starboard side ?

 

Also did it have spi ?

[Christopher Wolfe]

15 hours ago, brokenenglish said:

No Robin, the ED engine made by Webra was the 1.5cc ED Hawk (very similar to the Webra Rekord).
I see the ED Pep being criticised, but I've had 3 or 4 through my hands and they've all been excellent runners.
The common feature between the Pep and the Hawk is that neither was actually made by ED. The Pep was actually made by an ED sub-contractor in Brentford High Street and was subsequently transformed to become the ZA 92.

 

 

I once purchased a Sherline lathe (original Australian model with a brass bed).

 

Included to sweeten the deal was a new in box ED Pep which when auctioned actually paid for the Sherline lathe with a bit left over 😉

 

Apparently relatively few were manufactured compared to other ED model diesel engines and the collectors like them.

 

* Chris *

[Richard Harris]

MDS 58 (could have been a 48)that was fitted into a Vmar CAP which was equally as awful. 

Could never get it to run constantly even after changing the carb. 

Model was destroyed and I think I have the motor to someone.

Edited October 20 by Richard Harris

[J D 8 - Moderator]

3 hours ago, Rich Griff said:

Hi Jd8,

As a matter of interest, did the medalion red intake manifold have a short fuel pipe sized stub on the starboard side ?

 

Also did it have spi ?

  Hello Rich, Yes the Cox Medallion 09 has that stub as did a Medallion 15 I once had. It is a connection to pressurize a fuel tank.  I have heard it can make needle setting rather critical but can not be sure as I have never tried it.  To use it one has to drill out all the way into the crank case, engine has to be stripped to do this and clear any swarf.

[Rich Griff]

Yep, made a huge difference to the td09's I had way back when, and nowadays too.

 

Td's have the same slider type silencer, but not rc'd. They also have spi.

 

Anyways, back to the unlovable engine examples out there....

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

1 hour ago, Richard Harris said:

MDS 58 (could have been a 48)that was fitted into a Vmar CAP which was equally as awful. 

Could never get it to run constantly even after changing the carb. 

Model was destroyed and I think I have the motor to someone.

I was given an MDS 58 by a disgruntled owner, who couldn't  get it to run for more than a few seconds.  I did spend an hour or two getting it to run consistently but once set up and run in a little, it gave excellent power - far from rice puddings, it would probably pull the skin off a rhinocerous!  I was warned not to put it in a model as it would be bound to cause its demise...this was true but not through a dead stick, but through elevator flutter on a fast low pass.  The model (Minicraft Javelin) was totalled with the silencer ripped off, leaving the threaded bosses cracked open.

 

It had run so well that I removed the cracked bosses to relieve any stresses and fitted a clamp on silencer.  It then went into a rather well used 58" Glen's CAP 232 which I used very successfully as a winter hack for several years.  I might dig it out again soon!

 

I have to admit that no engine that I've had springs to mind as unliked.  The engine that gave me most problems was a Super Tigre 90 which was frustrating in that it would deadstick at most unexpected times.  The usual spraybar reorientation tweak was tried and then a Perry Pump was trumpeted as the magic cure - while it liberated oodles of extra power (and fuel consumption, necessitating fitting an auxilary tank) the intermittent deadsticks continued.  The cure, hit on in desperation, was to fit an OS F four stroke plug and once fitted, transformed the engine into something befitting its name.

 

 

[Martin McIntosh]

MDS again. In 1992 I changed career, moved house and gave away most of what I had. I worked in Texas for over a year and on a visit home I heard models flying in a local field. Started collecting stuff. The model press was full of praise for MDS motors so I got a 48, computer gear, a kit etc. The throttle kept jamming fully open because the carb slot had been machined to a letter P shape! Motor ran well but throttling was an issue. I discovered that 10% nitro and a cooler plug fixed everything and clubmates were amazed at the slow idle and fast pickup. I eventually almost gave away the airframe and motor to someone who was struggling but he could not start it.

[Maninder]

It feels like I must have been one of the few MDS owners who hit lucky. My MDS40 in a HMM Moonraker performed well but was a little noisy. I had a super-quiet silencer manufactured by a chap who used to advertise in the modelling magazines and it really quietened the engine down. With this silencer the MDS sounded like an engine with a quiet tuned pipe. It was a pretty powerful combination too. Having said that, the silencer did cost nearly the same as the MDS.

 

Perhaps the comarades who manufactured it had been on the Vodka bottle on that particular day as it performed brilliantly. I still have it!

[David Davis]

17 minutes ago, Maninder said:

It feels like I must have been one of the few MDS owners who hit lucky. My MDS40 in a HMM Moonraker performed well but was a little noisy. I had a super-quiet silencer manufactured by a chap who used to advertise in the modelling magazines and it really quietened the engine down. With this silencer the MDS sounded like an engine with a quiet tuned pipe. It was a pretty powerful combination too. Having said that, the silencer did cost nearly the same as the MDS.

 

Perhaps the comarades who manufactured it had been on the Vodka bottle on that particular day as it performed brilliantly. I still have it!

 

Martin Forest used to fit quiet ends to standard silencers. I remember buying one or two from him and being amazed at the quietness.

 

Was it him Maninder?

[Maninder]

2 minutes ago, David Davis said:

 

Martin Forest used to fit quiet ends to standard silencers. I remember buying one or two from him and being amazed at the quietness.

 

Was it him Maninder?

Hi David, yes it was. He either fitted a quiet extension to the front half of a standard 2S silencer or made one up from scratch as a complete unit for an extra £5. Mine was the latter type. I always thought that he must have been very skilled to be able to come up with soemthing so effective.

[Konrad]

I would classify any OS engine that used the single step plating process for the application of nickel, they deceptively advertised as  ABC "type", as slag engines. [This was in some time period before their marketing term ABL [A Blatant Lie]. ABL was a dual step (layer) plating process]. This was aimed at unsuspecting customers as performance engines. What a disappointment compared to any Rossi of the same time period!

 

Some of the engines of my manufacture were also an exercise in sheer frustration,  but a learning experience!

 

I liked the MDS engines as they where good sport engines that ran strong on FAI type fuel. I ran my early MDS on 78 methanol 20 caster oil and 2% 3% acetone. If I had a dud I usually could trace this to a mis-profiled low speed mixture needle. Again easy for most modelers to re-profile the needle as part of any engine tuning efforts (like setting fuel tank level and finding the glow plug heat range) but not for the rank beginner. The x8 series of engine could tolerate some low nitro fuels like 5%nitro. But none of them really could tolerate what we in the USA used as a sport fuel 15% nitro.

 

The Enya R1.20 still holds a soft spot in my heart.

 

I still love these engines and they are still in my collection. Most are NIB or very low time engines.  Today all my sport and most of performance planes are electric. I still have some Nelson and Jett racers should the boys want to make bad air.

Edited November 28 by Konrad