WWII aircraft armament machine guns and cannon

[Pumpkin]

Some diesels had what was effectively a flame thrower in the intake manifold.
The ones I have seen used a spark plug to ignite a stream of pressurized fuel.
A different problem could have been the fuel jelling, this can be a problem with diesel.

[Mike Irwin]

That's why the Russians had multiple grades of diesel fuel that were distributed depending on temperature range.

When proper seasonal fuels were hard to come by troops would mix in their own anti-gelling agents, mainly gasoline or kerosene or even alcohol, to varying degrees of success.

[44 AMP]

Being as it was their home, and the Russians had been dealing with Russian winters as long as they had lived there, I'm sure they had developed several "tricks" to start and keep vehicles running in the extreme cold.

One I remember reading about was demonstrated to Luftwaffe pilots and ground crew by a "Hiwi" (Soviet POW working for the Germans)

He opened the lower engine cover of a 109, and "called for a parts tray" (large shallow pan) put gas in it, and lit it. The Germans were horrified, thinking it would burn away the wiring, but it didn't. The flames blazed away merrily licking the underside of the engine for a few minutes, the died, leaving the engine and wiring untouched, just warmed up enough to turn over and start.

My Father in law got a GMC diesel pickup in the 80s, for a good price, diesels weren't that popular back then. We live in an area where below freezing is common in the winter, but single digits or sub zero is not that usual, but does happen, in a hard winter. And, did one year, sudden really cold snap, and he truck wouldn't run. The fuel had "jelled". Required replacing the injectors and some other work to fix. I recall he bitterly complained that "no one told me about needing to add stove oil to the fuel when it got really cold.."

Thinning the fuel and the oil, warming the engines and other tricks were well known and used by the people experienced living in arctic temps, but not so well known to others.

One of the gadgets the Germans came up with after their first Soviet winter was the Kuhlwasserubertraeger, a system connecting the cooling systems of vehicles, allowing the warm coolant of a running engine to be exchanged with a cold one, warming up the cold engine so it could be started.

[RC20]

He opened the lower engine cover of a 109, and "called for a parts tray" (large shallow pan) put gas in it, and lit it. The Germans were horrified, thinking it would burn away the wiring, but it didn't. The flames blazed away merrily licking the underside of the engine for a few minutes, the died, leaving the engine and wiring untouched, just warmed up enough to turn over and start.

You seem deep into myth stuff. No one is going to do that with an aircraft engine.
It s wrong on so many fronts (pun intended). Oil fires and wires burned. You do not get that a fire is only going to catch other stuff on fire, its not going to do anything to warm up an engine unless its long and sustained.

Being as it was their home, and the Russians had been dealing with Russian winters as long as they had lived there, I'm sure they had developed several "tricks" to start and keep vehicles running in the extreme cold.

The Russians had little experience with vehicles as they had none. Tractors did not run in the winter.

Mike has it right that they could created Kerosene which was what was used in Alaska for winter diesel (good old Stove Oil).

Or you can thin it, Vodka comes to mind but probably considered a waste even if desperate with German tanks looming across the meadow.

They did know how to survive in the cold and had the gear for it. Different than making machinery work in the cold.

Some diesels had what was effectively a flame thrower in the intake manifold.
The ones I have seen used a spark plug to ignite a stream of pressurized fuel.
A different problem could have been the fuel jelling, this can be a problem with diesel.

Glow plugs came along, they were not in use in WWII to the best of my knowledge.
Many tractors used a gasoline start and a shift to diesel run but the Russians did not have that system. Air start will do it though its brutal and a reason Russian tank engines wore out fast.

The most common resort was to drain the oil and heat it or keep it warm and pour it in once ready to go (at least in Alaska aircraft).

[44 AMP]

You seem deep into myth stuff. No one is going to do that with an aircraft engine.

And you seem deep into the idea that no one ever did anything that seemed stupid, but worked.

the lighting the pan of gas under the engine incident I recounted is in the Blond Knight of Germany by Toliver & Constable, a bio of Eric Hartmann, and from what I understand, was written with numerous first hand accounts.

The war is FULL of them, things people did that seemed to defy common sense, but sometimes did work.

And while the Russian peasantry wasn't familiar with tractors and other machinery the way US farmboys by and large were, there were people in Russia that did have mechanical knowledge beyond the peasants. And, if not, the Soviet Army would teach them.

[Pumpkin]

Did any have a separate gas powered starter engine like Caterpillar used/uses?

You better careful starting a diesel on gas. You can end up with a bunch of broken pistons or piston rings. Did they fog the intake with gas or inject it directly into the cylinder?

Aircraft:
Those aircraft engines were some nasty oil leaking machines. I could see an open flame causing something to smolder and catch fire.

The 109, Ju87, Ju88, He111 didn’t have an oil filled crankcase. The engine was inverted, installed upside down necessitating a dry sump setup with a oil tank. Maybe they heated the oil tank?

Edit:
Having direct gasoline injection would have been an advantage starting in the cold. I believe the Russian planes were carbureted.

[105kw]

I do know what the US solution to extreme cold weather engine starts was.
US fighters had an oil dilute switch for the pilot, before shutdown, hit the switch for up to 30 seconds and send a shot of fuel into the oil sump.
At start up, when the engine hit running temp, the gas evaporated.

[Mike Irwin]

This is supposedly an image taken at a German WW II base in Russia of a heater cart being used to assist starting an Me 109.




This is a similar device being used in Alaska on a P-40 Warhawk.



As far as I know, pretty much every military during WW II had similar devices for use in cold weather climates.

The US employed literally thousands of the Type F1A utility heater that were used pretty much anywhere heated air was needed -- warming aircraft, tanks, and other vehicles or even supplying heating to barracks.

Essentially it was small gasoline engine that powered both the gasoline burner (similar to a modern torpedo heater, I believe) and also a fan that circulated air through a heat exchange chamber, not unlike a modern forced air furnace.

The one being used with the Warhawk may be an earlier version of the F1A.


As for building a literal fire under a tank engine, that was done, but only under the oil sump. Basically it was to warm and thin the oil.

More than once in years past did I do something similar with an old John Deere tractor -- basically built a small fire in a bucket and sat it under the sump.

The idea wasn't to let the flames actually lick the sump, it was to get a good solid bed of coals and a little active fire that would heat the oil sump without licking flames and soot up over the bottom of the engine.

[RC20]

I helped heat up an airplane engine a lot

What Mike Irwin is showing is the way it is done (the assist I did was on a much smaller engine!).

Your so called first hand accounts are often rife and wrong.

Sg York Swore the statue is accurate when in fact its well researched that the rifle on that statue is wrong (1903 vs the Model of 1917 they were issued)

Having a Luger in his movie and no comment?

Oh, and lets not forget the sparang of the M1 en block clip, you know, the one no once can hear because all the shooting going on!

[Pumpkin]

The trouble with the inverted German V-12 aircraft engines was that the dry sump oil tank was mounted up top and in front of the engines crankcase.

Now heat applied from below would have warmed up oil in the oil cooler and coolant in the cylinder heads. This would have certainly helped combustion and starting as long as you could spin the engine fast enough.

[RC20]

You better careful starting a diesel on gas. You can end up with a bunch of broken pistons or piston rings. Did they fog the intake with gas or inject it directly into the cylinder?

I see the need for some education. Keep in mind I grew up in Alaska, I have seen and operated machinery in -40 and lived and saw it run at -65.

You dilute the diesel fuel with gasoline or flamage fluid like alcohol.

They did have tractors that started on gas and when the engine was running and heated up, they had a switch system to shift to diesel. I know a guy who restores tractors and he showed me how it works. Very slick. In that case they did not mix gas and diesel.

Cat went with Pony engines.

Kerosene is a form of diesel, it was called stove oil or number 1 (vs standard Number 2). In Alaska you got really good stove oil because it was all one product sold at different prices.

We still switch to Number 1 diesel for engines in the winter time. Have not run a stove on Stove oil, may be separate now with the additives with Ultra Low Sulfur diesel.

They start diluting the diesel tanks with number 1 diesel in September so they have full change over by the time winter hits.

And yes, people get caught out with a tank top off before the switch starts.

My method was to order Number 1 Diesel for my fire pumps and generators all year around (they finally kept it in stock for people that had equipment like I did, backup power does not care about effici8enty7, it just needs to run)

In fact one set of 3 generators was fed off a Jet A tank. Not supposed to but they did and the engines were going fine last I saw.

Issue came up when ULSD came on and then they had to stop doing that as they were filling trucks that needed ULSD for the emissions. None in affect when they started t he operation. Jet A is much like Number 1.

[RC20]

As for building a literal fire under a tank engine, that was done, but only under the oil sump. Basically it was to warm and thin the oil.

More than once in years past did I do something similar with an old John Deere tractor -- basically built a small fire in a bucket and sat it under the sump.

The idea wasn't to let the flames actually lick the sump, it was to

Mike: Spot on for a tractor. How do you get a fire under a tank engine? Bottom plate in the way.

So a hard not on tank engines.

Yes you can heat from below given enough time.

Point is you are not going to have a short pan fire under an engine and do it. Takes upwards of hours depending on the temperature.

I did it with my 73 Bronco when I got hit with a -50 deg morning. Got my propane camp stove out, fire it up and let it run for a couple of course (keeping a close eye on it, open flames and oil on engines dripping is no joke of course).

You can even cowl an airplane engine and get a fire going. It won't heat the oil up much if any but enough heat for easier gasoline ignition. Well you could heat up the oil but again, a couple hours below 0.

The standard for AK small aircraft is actualy a direct fire gas heater. AKA Red Dragon. But you have a longer duct and that ensures the flames do not get into the bottom of the engine.

Heat exchange type are safer but they also do not heat up as good.

[Pumpkin]

"I see the need for some education. Keep in mind I grew up in Alaska, I have seen and operated machinery in -40 and lived and saw it run at -65."

Okay,
I retired (35 yrs) from and large engine lab test facility with as high a technical position possible.

In the 80's we tested various military diesel and gasoline engines with with varying percentages of gas/diesel mixtures. This was done to find out how far you could extend the particular vehicles range without a full tank of the proper fuel in an emergency situation.

The gasoline engines would crack the piston ring grooves, and rings due to the mix being such a low octane. It would knock and rattle until it failed or burned the complete vehicles fuel supply. If I remember correctly 70/30 gas diesel was the limit. Although the gas engine had damaged parts it always made it to the EOT.

I had an old spoke wheel JohnDeere B that was designed to start on gas and be able to switch over to kerosine after warming up. The gas tank was very small compared to the main tank. It didn't have a starter motor

We also tested military application diesels on varying mixtures of diesel and gas.
This again was to simulate a vehicle fuel load mixed for emergency use.
A 500hp diesel lost 125hp on the final blend of I believe a mix of 60/40 diesel/87 oct gas. It sounded terrible, knocking really hard because of the fuel detonating.

I disassembled both engines before and after each test weighing and measuring bearings, rings, cylinders, carbon buildup etc. This took about a week before and after each test.
The diesel engine with one of the later blends eroded the top of some pistons so much you could see the part of the top compression ring. Damage was significant. On 2 occasions the testing was stopped because of broken exhaust valves.

We also had several cold boxes capable of -60, -70F where cold start testing was done.

I guess these mixtures were more severe than the ones you mention.

[Jim Watson]

A less extreme case of peasant ingenuity; it doesn’t get all that cold here in Alabama, but an elderly vehicle can use a bit of help at 4:00 AM in February. My Dad inverted an old light fixture in the carport and lit a bulb under the oil pan of the old Buick. That made for an easier start on his way to work.

[bamaranger]

I don't recall where I read it, but one US pilot called the K-14 sight the "no miss'em" sight. That sight was in fighter aircraft.

The computing sights on the US heavy bomber power turrets were state of the art. By the time the B29 came into service, the sighting system on the SuperFort was extremely advanced. Turrets (excluding the tail) were all operated remotely, and multiple turrets could be synched by the gunners to engage one aircraft from a single firing station. The computing system took into account AC speed, altitude, range, even I believe wind (?).

Pretty sure the Axis had nothing like it by '45

[Pumpkin]

I don't think anyone did on either side.

Look at the engine nacelle gun positions on a Russian Petlyakov Pe-8 heavy bomber. They were in the in the same nacelle that the landing gear and inboard engines were. If the enemy fighters didn't get you the fumes from the engines must have. Horrible design.

[Mike Irwin]

"They did have tractors that started on gas and when the engine was running and heated up, they had a switch system to shift to diesel. I know a guy who restores tractors and he showed me how it works. Very slick. In that case they did not mix gas and diesel."

I used to use one of those, an Oliver, IIRC.

What most people don't know about some of those early tractors is that they could burn multiple types of fuel -- kerosene, gasoline, diesel, home heating oil, tractor distillate -- with virtually no adjustment required. Basically they were set up so that the farmer could literally burn whatever was cheapest (or available) at the time.

If something like kerosene or diesel was being used, the small starter fuel tank could be filled with gasoline. I was never clear whether it would start fully on gasoline, or whether the gasoline would be mixed with the primary fuel.

My guess is that there would be some mixing going on unless the carb were cleared of the primary fuel.

[Mike Irwin]

" How do you get a fire under a tank engine?"

Heat travels.

I didn't need to be a huge, roaring fire, either. Just enough that it would put heat where it needed to be to slowly warm the engine through warming the oil.

Taking the oil from -40 C to even -10 C would make a huge different in engine starts.

No, certainly not the desired way to do it, but remember... A running tank is a LOT more effective than one that's not running and necessity is the Mother of saying "fuggit, we've got to get inventive because we gotta get moving."

[RC20]

I will apologize, clearly you have been around this stuff. From the wording it sounded like someone who did not know diesel ops at all.

What you are also listing is a different aspect. Dilution of diesel in cold temps is not intended to do any more than deal with the jelling (wax up) aspect. Thinner winter fuel (or that is how we described it) was one answer. If you mixed fuels you did it with as little mix as you found worked.

Kerosene was a better answer (stove oil) as it had the lubricity. Gasoline or any other flammable is going to dilute the lubricity as well as change the Cetane (octane for diesel roughly equivalent). Where does that leave our heroes? Possible damage to the engine and injector system that has tolerance down to .000X (how good the Russkies were I do not know, that is tight tolerance in war time factories let alone for the Russian tech level (cal its extremly uneven).

Okay,
I retired (35 yrs) from and large engine lab test facility with as high a technical position possible.

In the 80's we tested various military diesel and gasoline engines with with varying percentages of gas/diesel mixtures. This was done to find out how far you could extend the particular vehicles range without a full tank of the proper fuel in an emergency situation.

The gasoline engines would crack the piston ring grooves, and rings due to the mix being such a low octane. It would knock and rattle until it failed or burned the complete vehicles fuel supply. If I remember correctly 70/30 gas diesel was the limit. Although the gas engine had damaged parts it always made it to the EOT.

I had an old spoke wheel JohnDeere B that was designed to start on gas and be able to switch over to kerosine after warming up. The gas tank was very small compared to the main tank. It didn't have a starter motor

We also tested military application diesels on varying mixtures of diesel and gas.
This again was to simulate a vehicle fuel load mixed for emergency use.
A 500hp diesel lost 125hp on the final blend of I believe a mix of 60/40 diesel/87 oct gas. It sounded terrible, knocking really hard because of the fuel detonating.

I disassembled both engines before and after each test weighing and measuring bearings, rings, cylinders, carbon buildup etc. This took about a week before and after each test.
The diesel engine with one of the later blends eroded the top of some pistons so much you could see the part of the top compression ring. Damage was significant.


On 2 occasions the testing was stopped because of broken exhaust valves.

We also had several cold boxes capable of -60, -70F where cold start testing was done.

I guess these mixtures were more severe than the ones you mention.

[RC20]

I am seperating this out as it is of interest on context.

Kerosene for many years was the tractor fuel and it ran on ignition system not CI. High quality gasoline was a latter 30s and early 50s change.

Its one reason diesel were a Cat mainstay and others at least offered it. Kerosene or diesel was consistent enough you could DESIGN and engine that worked on it.

And that is the key. Design. All fuels will work, you need to design around them. Some will be so bad you have to pull a head and clean the head and piston tops and change oil often (you did early days as well per the ND oils - crud settled in those and you drained out the crud). Some good stuff on what oil to use now on older engines.

One of the points is the Russians were not stupid, they basically had to use diesel for the tanks and they worked out a system to do so. Alaska was no different, we shifted to stove oil in the winter.

I ran those Gen sets on Jet A. Lubricity wise (pre ULSD) you were not supposed to. But too we skipped that era when they screwed up the lubricity when they went to ) 500?) ppm sulfur.

We never had injector issues in wear and tear but then standby gen sets don't get tons of hours (usually 26 to 30 a year mostly testing).

We did get nozzle seal leaks, that may have been the ULSD and just the old seals or it could have been the fuel and it could have been a combination of those two and being heated all the time (standby get sets are kept at 110 deg so when they start and rack up to 1800 RPM its not cold engine).

Best if you have a heated oil system as well but that was only on the slow 1200 or 900 RPM engines that were really intended as prime power use.

[RC20]

Heat travels.

I didn't need to be a huge, roaring fire, either. Just enough that it would put heat where it needed to be to slowly warm the engine through warming the oil.

Taking the oil from -40 C to even -10 C would make a huge different in engine starts.

Mike: I get it but have you ever seen a tank engine compartment? There is no room UNDER the engine, its right above the bottom steel.

No way your are lighting a fire direly under the engine and a fire under the tank is going to heat up the bottom steel to some deg but it would take large hours to have an affect inside the engine compartment.

Air start solves the spinning it problem. We know the Ruskies had air start and they had charge carts for air refill. At a guess they would start it with the cart and then top up the tanks if they needed to shut down and re-start.

Clearly they had thinner winter diesel. It would wax up the filters if you did not (and yes I have seen it and many others up here have as well).

The Russkie engineers were not stupid, they had to live within the limits of the system and their system simply had poor gasoline and you can't get good engine performance out of bad gas. Ergo, where they needed the power they went with a diesel engine and came up with work arounds to keep it viable.

Of interest was the trucks sent to Russia. Studabaker. they had the lowest compression gas engines made for military trucks. That made them a better fit for the poor Russian gas.

As an aside, the Prudhoe bay oil field has its (or had) its own refinery. Sadly they cracked lousy gas. The octane was 60 (they did not want to pay for the 3rd stage system as it cost a lot as well as cost to run).

So, all gas engines up there pinged like crazy. The replaced a LOT of engines.

When ULSD finally got mandated they gave up and shipped in the diesel and had the gas previously shipped in. Newer rigs with emissions stuff would not run on the crud gas they were making.

[RC20]

A less extreme case of peasant ingenuity; it doesn’t get all that cold here in Alabama, but an elderly vehicle can use a bit of help at 4:00 AM in February. My Dad inverted an old light fixture in the carport and lit a bulb under the oil pan of the old Buick. That made for an easier start on his way to work.

When we got married we were living in a very small two room cabin. No room for a fridge.

I had a fridge, so I set it up to work on the back porch. Put in a light bulb and a stat and the light would come on to warm up the inside!

My wife was amazed. We grew up making do up here.

[Pumpkin]

RC20,
I did quite a bit of work on a White/Hercules/Continental multi fuel 6 cyl deuce and a half engine.

It was very low output, a 478-cubic-inch (7.8 L), turbocharged engine making only 134 hp and 330 ft lbs of torque.

It would run on stoddard solvent, JP8, JP4, diesel, used crankcase oil, gasoline and my boss said if you had some mop water that was contaminated enough (with hydrocarbons) it would run on that. It was an amazing beast.

I also got pretty good at rebuilding Stanadyne Roosamaster injection pumps, these were standard equipment on the first Hummers.
They didn't like JP4 too much, the rotor shaft would often seize killing the pump.

The 50cal vs 20mm video:
After watching this I came away with feeling that maybe the 50cal was the equivalent to mama bears bed and porridge.
Not too little and not too big, just right. Hits on important components were at a premium and its rate of fire helped with this.
Maybe if we would have faced enemy bombers equivalent to ours the need for an upgraded gun for our interceptors might have unfolded. As it was, we were more worried about engaging the enemy fighters and getting them to leave the fight one way or another.

[RC20]

That is interesting and also on the Standodyne.

Cummins used them on certain versions of the 5.9 though I think the Dodge unit used a Boche in line system.

I came up with a tool to slip on the plastic coupler on one we had in the shop. Usually we did not work on them but it was the owners car.

I had one I pulled off our 5.9 Backup Gen engine, got water through it twice. Idiots had run the vent for the day tank up through the 2nd story roof (flat). Got enough water in the day tank (no Racor) and into the Standyne. Ungh.

I t thought crud fill from construction until the 2nd time. Then I started tracing the vent line, and it was, drats (stronger than that).

Not sure if I was more ticked at myself for not following the line or the plumbers. No cap, open top. I failed to realize there was no pipe with the Hat on it around the Gen room.

[RC20]

The trouble with the inverted German V-12 aircraft engines was that the dry sump oil tank was mounted up top and in front of the engines crankcase.

Now heat applied from below would have warmed up oil in the oil cooler and coolant in the cylinder heads. This would have certainly helped combustion and starting as long as you could spin the engine fast enough.

Dry sump tank would have been on the bottom. storage tank someplace, could be above.

My Honda 750 had the dry sump system. Just enough to collect oil on the bottom and in its case, the oil tank was on the side of the cycle.

I do not believe for a fraction of a 2nd they used an pan with fuel on it. You have to keep the heat going for hours sub zero.

If you could tent over the engine you could build a fire and you would warm up the whole engine over time. Be slow but possible. Watch it like a Hawk, av gas and oil drippings would be bad news with direct fire.

The Dragon heater was direct but it was off to one side so nothing directly under the engine with open flame. No, we did not drive off leaving it to heat!