Conference vmszoo::rc

1607.0. "Gas Turbine engines for RC Planes" by WAYOUT::TALBOT (Trevor Talbot) Mon Jun 20 1994 13:45

Hi,

	I recently attended Top Gun '94 here in the
U.K. (a ducted fan meet) where a French company named 
JPX were demoing a gas turbine engine, designed for use
on RC planes. Now several models at this event made 
good use of these engines, even despite the 2.5K price
tag!! They sound really good and gave excellent 
reliability and performance(mind you at those prices you
should get nothing else! :-))

	Now not knowing an awful lot about these beasties
the following was obviously key to it's operation, but
can anybody describe how these types of engines work?

	The field box requires the lugging along of a
SCUBA air tank, a PROPANE gas cylinder and some other
dodgy looking items...the ignition phase seems a little
tricky if not dangerous.. what dangers are there? I
also saw a few fire extinquishers at hand..so I can guess
the fire danger.

-Trev

    Actually, this engine will probably soon be obsolete.  There is a real
    kero burning engine being run now that is much safer and produces more
    thrust.  Propane based setups are too flamible.  I have read about
    several experiences with fires on board during starting.
    
    Charlie
    

    The kero type turbine is suppose to be out this summer. It has smaller
    dimemsions than JPX model that uses propane and it produces 120,000
    rpm. I believe it will be US made. Have not seen anthing on price yet.