Atwell, 6164   WA

Design and build a makeshift propeller for a Rolls Royce Merlin aero engine

The Aviation Heritage Museum in Perth had acquired a working Merlin engine built by Rolls Royce during WWII. Here is a link to some historical information about the engine:
http://www.stallion51.com/p51-flight-ops/p51-merlin-engine.shtml

But to run the engine required a propeller of some sort, since without an air flow to the radiator the engine was getting overheated pretty quickly. The manager of the Museum, Mr. John Park has contacted ME&QC with the request to design and build the makeshift propeller for the engine.

The first step was to visit the museum and take all the measurements on site for the follow up design of the propeller. There was not much information available on the Internet or in the Museum itself. Everything had to be designed from scratch. The pictures below show the steps taken to make it all happen.

 

This is the shaft end onto which the propeller has to be installed.

A sketch of the shaft end made on site

A General Arrangement drawing of the propeller is done.

An exploded view of the propeller assembly.

  A working drawing of the propeller hub.

Initial fitting of newly machined parts onto the engine’s shaft required a minimum amount of work. Mainly—to clean up the shaft from protective paint.

The propeller is assembled and installed.

Here is a first trial. Everything works as expected!