Having always been fascinated by mechanical things, this one caught my eye rather quickly :
It started life as a Russian 42 cylinder diesel radial engine putting out around 4000 hp and used in Soviet missile boats which had three of these beasts installed :
As it weighed 5.4 tonnes in its bare form, one would have thought that there would not be too many applications for it outside large boats. It seems though that a German tractor pulling team had other ideas and after some considerable modification they produced this methonol burning version complete with 126 spark plugs and 168 valves and 10000 hp :
And, after producing a monster like that, I suppose you could forgive the somewhat over the top vehicle it sits in :
Interesting that the Ruskies put the cylinders inline, rather than staggered like aero engines. But then this monster is liquid cooled, rather than trying to get a consistent airflow between multiple banks like the
P&W R4360!
I also wonder why the Germans converted it to methanol – pulling heavy loads needs TORQUE not horsepower, and diesels are pretty good at producing that. Maybe it’s a sop to the Eco brigade – nice bright flames are not quite so Polar Bear destroying as massive clouds of black soot. They could even run it on corn ethanol and be the first “Carbon Neutral” tractor pullers!
Sarcasm Off…
microdave – it is an interesting beast yes – I would love to get my hands on one 🙂