Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust
Historical Series Reviews - Page 05
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PARKSIDE Softbound, 208mm x 148mm x 13mm, 249 pages Recommended Retail Price: 181 photos/illustrations |
Reviewed by Doug Culy
Parkside (R-RHT Historical Series No 39) is the story of Armstrong Siddeley’s (AS) rise as a producer of gas turbine engines—and the story of its slow decline. Overall, the Parkside plant provided engines and cars (for a while) from 1896 to 1994, longer than most facilities have survived the advance of production technology. The first half of this period was covered by Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust Historical Series No. 11, ARMSTRONG SIDDELEY – the Parkside story 1896 – 1939.
During WWII, Parkside produced mainly the Cheetah 834 in³ 7-cylinder radial engine, of which over 25,000 were built. Also at Parkside were production and development activities for the Tiger 1,512 in³ 14-cylinder radial (actually a renamed Jaguar), the Deerhound three-row 21-cylinder radial, and the Cougar 9-cylinder radial. These effectively ended the production of AS piston aircraft engines. Also in production during WWII were the AS line of cars contemporary to Jaguar and Rolls-Royce (R-R), and torpedo motors. The book devotes a dozen or so pages to bomb damage (Parkside was located in Coventry) from several German air raids. Gas turbine activities had started during the war with the building of a scale demonstrator for A.A.Griffith’s first axial-flow engine, as a turbocharger, and with a steam turbine aero engine. Late in 1942, AS began development of the ASX reverse-flow axial turbojet engine, which started test in 1943.
After WWII Parkside was used for further production of cars until 1960 (amazingly including the Sunbeam Alpine sports car) and to build 1-, 2-, and 3-cylinder diesel generator sets. The ASX was revised to turboprop configuration and was developed as the Python. Their next engine was the Mamba turboprop, produced in single and twin configurations, the jet version of which was the Adder. AS took over the development of the 7,500-lb-t Sapphire axial turbojet from Metropolitan Vickers, and this later became the USAF J65. A small turboshaft/prop engine, the 1,100-shp P181/P182 was demonstrated but not produced. The Sapphire provided the background for the 1000-lb-t Viper, which was initiated as a short-life missile engine. It was shortly seen to have much merit for manned-aircraft and continued development to 4,400 lb-t, and over 5,000 were built, including off-shore production. The Gamma rocket engine was developed, and AS absorbed the Blackburn engine line, which included licensed production of Turbomeca engines. After merger with R-R in 1961, Parkside was assigned the building of the 7760-lb-t M45H turbofan development engines from the R-R joint venture with Snecma. This was the engine for the Fokker 614 airliner, and only 60 were built. By the late 1960s, R-R transferred much Viper production to other plants, and in 1979, R-R transferred Adour production to Parkside, and the abortive R-R RB401 5400-lb-t turbofan was developed there around 1980 to compete with the Garrett TFE731. From then on, whole engine production gradually went away while Parkside was focused more on parts for various R-R engines. In 1988, parts production began to be sent to other R-R facilities, and in 1994, Parkside was sold to a real estate developer.
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Overhaul of Merlin Engines Softbound, 208mm x 148mm x 13mm, 203 pages Recommended Retail Price: 57 photographs |
Reviewed by Doug Culy
This book is actually two separate books describing the problems of operating and maintaining Merlin engines under differing kinds of severe environments during WWII.
The authors describe in detail the privations of bad fuel (Russia), spares supply shortages, and inadequately trained maintainers.
Of particular interest are the many overhaul reports and inter-office communications shown from Indian operations, and the report summarizing the Russian experience, by a R-R team sent there upon request for support (after previously refusing offers of help) by the Russian government.
Also insightful are descriptions of cultural attitudes in India about who should be doing maintenance work, and about how the Russian air service perceived foreign aircraft given to them. Operation of these aircraft under really bad conditions is well described. There is plenty of worthwhile discussion supplying background for the setting-up and conduct of maintenance operations in both regions, and a satisfying number of useful photos.
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