Rolls-Royce Vulture
| Vulture | |
|---|---|
| |
| Type | Piston X-24 aero engine |
| Manufacturer | Rolls-Royce Limited |
| First run | Template:Avyear |
| Major applications | Avro Manchester Hawker Henley Vickers Warwick |
| Number built | 538 |
| Developed from | Rolls-Royce Peregrine |
The Rolls-Royce Vulture was a British aero engine of the World War II era that was designed and built by Rolls-Royce Limited. The Vulture used the unusual "X-24" configuration, whereby a pair of V12 Rolls-Royce Peregrine engines were effectively joined by a common crankshaft. The engine was originally designed to produce around 1,750 horsepower, but continuing problems with both the Vulture and the underlying Peregrine design meant that they were derated to around 1,450-1,550 hp in service.
Although several new aircraft designs had been planned to use the Vulture, work on the engine's design ended in 1941 as Rolls concentrated on their more successful Merlin design. Another engine produced to the same criteria, the Napier Sabre, would prove more successful after a lengthy development period.
Design and development
The Peregrine, a supercharged Kestrel, was a fairly standard design, with two cylinder banks arranged in a V form and with a displacement of 21.2 litres. The Vulture was basically two Peregrines joined at the crankcase, producing an X engine configuration with a displacement of 42.5 litres.
Both engines suffered from a far too short pre-service development period and the reliability was very poor. Apart from delivering significantly less than the designed power, the Vulture suffered from frequent failures of the big-end connecting-rod bearings, which was found to be caused by a breakdown in lubrication, and also from other engine heat dissipation problems. Rolls-Royce were initially confident that they could solve the problems, however the company's much smaller Merlin had already reached the same power level as the Vulture's original specification, and so production of the Vulture was discontinued after only 538 had been built.[1]
Applications
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The Vulture had been intended to power the Hawker Tornado interceptor, but with the cancellation of Vulture development, Hawker abandoned the Tornado and concentrated on the Hawker Typhoon, which was powered by the Napier Sabre. Likewise, the same cancellation caused the abandonment of the Vulture-engined version of the Vickers Warwick bomber.
The only aircraft type designed for the Vulture to actually go into production was the twin-engined Avro Manchester. When the engine reliability problems became clear, the Avro team persuaded the Air Ministry that switching to a four-Merlin version of the Manchester, which had been in development as a contingency plan, was preferable to retooling Avro's factories to make the Handley Page Halifax. The resulting aircraft was initially called the Manchester Mark III and then renamed Lancaster, going on to great success as the RAF's leading heavy bomber.
Application list
Specifications (Vulture V)
Data from Lumsden [3]
General characteristics
- Type: 24-cylinder supercharged liquid-cooled 90 degree X layout aircraft piston engine
- Bore: 5 inches (127 mm)
- Stroke: 5.5 inches (139.7 mm)
- Displacement: 2,592 in³ (42.47 L)
Components
- Valvetrain: Overhead camshaft
- Supercharger: Gear-driven centrifugal type supercharger, two speed
- Fuel system: Downdraught S.U. carburettor
- Fuel type: Petrol
- Cooling system: Liquid cooled, 70% water/30% Ethylene glycol
Performance
- Power output: 1,780 hp at 2,850 rpm, +6 psi boost
- Compression ratio: 6:1
See also
Related development
Comparable engines
Related lists
References
Notes
Bibliography
- Lumsden, Alec. British Piston Engines and their Aircraft. Marlborough, Wiltshire: Airlife Publishing, 2003. ISBN 1-85310-294-6.
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