Talk:Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major

Move
Why? It seems to me that it violates the Wikipedia standard of common names; "Wasp Major" is a lot better known than "R-4360". &mdash;Morven 06:07, Oct 11, 2004 (UTC)

Hardly competitive
The article claims that the P/W of the 4360 was matched by few engines. I beg to differ. All of the Hypers outperformed it, as did practically every other US engine. More to the point the Sabre easily outperformed it, producing 3,500hp from under 2,500 lbs, and even the poor German engines running on 87 didn't do too badly, the Jumo 222 for instance.

The 4360 was big. That's all it was.

Maury 6 July 2005 00:42 (UTC)


 * giving a power to weight ratio of 1.11 hp/lb (1.83 kW/kg), which was matched or exceeded by very few contemporary engines. - depends on whether the weight figures include the turbochargers and (heavy) stainless steel ducting for them - one suspects not, as the usual US practice at the time was to classify the turbochargers as airframe weight, due them being mounted remotely from the engine, e.g., Thunderbolt, Lightning. Even so, as you correctly state, the quoted P/W figures aren't anything to write home about. 71 litres is a BIG engine, nearly twice the displacement of the Napier Sabre. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.112.78.10 (talk) 18:29, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Napier Sabre... better?? I hardly think so. The Sabre with its cartridge starter was a real fire bug. The Coffman cannister could remain hot enough to start a fire even after 5mins of idling. Standard ground procedure was to have fire crews standing by. All radial engines over 2800HP were problematic. The Wrights were notorious for stripping the turbo gears. The PW was an over-heater on the ground.27.33.243.103 (talk) 00:17, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Sabre engine fires were due to the pilot over-priming the cylinders, often after a failed start in cold weather. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.31.130.71 (talk) 11:21, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Mars
I believe that the Martin mars was powered by 3350s, not 4360s LorenzoB 22:41, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Good catch. I checked my sources to see if perhaps some prototypes or conversions used the Wasp Major, but have found anything as yet. - BillCJ 23:23, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Start system
I've added the "citation needed" expression to the text waiting for someone to prove me that Pratt & Whitney R-4360 or even the Fairchild C-82 Packet's Pratt & Whitney R-2800 (as used in "The Flight of the Phoenix" movie) used Coffman Starter. So far I believe such big engines used the more typical motor and inertia flywheel system. - RobertoRMola (talk) 13:35, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Cartridge starters have probably never been used on passenger liners, certainly not post WW2. The Coffman was dirty and sometimes made fires, and the AVPIN was positively dangerous even in military craft. The Bristol Belvedere used AVPINs, and they were quickly withdrawn from service because of the fire rate.27.33.243.103 (talk) 00:23, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * AVPIN was introduced for fighter aircraft such as the BAC Lightning to provide instant start-up for scrambles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.31.130.71 (talk) 11:26, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Semi-Helical Arrangement & Multi-Row Radial
I remember hearing that multi-row radials were difficult to work prior to the early 1940's because of airflow issues. Clearly the semi-helical arrangement fixed it, but there were twin-row radials before that which featured offset cylinders (if not all of 'em) and there were generally cooling issues when more than three rows were used until the 1940's, so did they simply refine the semi-helical arrangement, or were there other factors that enabled the engine to work? AVKent882 (talk) 17:41, 28 January 2011 (UTC)


 * They used baffles to direct the airflow around the cylinders. I don't know if that was unique to the R-4360, but it did help solve most of the cooling issues. I'll try to add a section of ths later, as I can, from a source on PW engines. - BilCat (talk) 20:24, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 * There were also trials with aux fans (notably in the BMW 801), tho AFAIK, never on a U.S. engine, & not with real success.  TREKphiler   any time you're ready, Uhura  23:47, 30 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Actually, a fan was used on each R-4360 on the B-36, as they were oussher pusher engines. I'm not sure how "successful" the installation was, though. - BilCat (talk)
 * Thx. I have a vague recollection of a fan in a fancy "jet thrust" cowling design. This one?  TREKphiler   any time you're ready, Uhura  03:25, 31 January 2011 (UTC)


 * The fans were just for cooling in the B-36, just to be clear. - BilCat (talk) 03:38, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

A 28 cylinder, 72l P&W Aero Engine is on display at the Isle of Man Motor Museum, Jurby, IOM. You might want to add it to the list. AnnaComnemna (talk) 19:16, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

Counterrotation?
Revisiting a move notion, I'm proposing the page be moved to either P&W R4360 or P&W Wasp Major, since the name, as is, combines both the military designation & civil name, neither of which were used together (AFAIK). TREKphiler  any time you're ready, Uhura  00:03, 10 June 2017 (UTC)


 * See here. - BilCat (talk) 01:58, 10 June 2017 (UTC)
 * I've never seen them together before.... I'll consider this move withdrawn as mistaken.  TREKphiler   any time you're ready, Uhura  02:52, 10 June 2017 (UTC)


 * No worries. - BilCat (talk) 08:18, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

External links modified (January 2018)
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--- Hi, I believe there is one of these engines at the RAAF Association Museum at Bullcreek, Western Australia. I'll try to verify that, and if I can then I'll update the section. Sorry for the anon. edit but I seem to have stuffed up my password and will attempt a reset - BernardWansbrough 19 Feb 21

Doesn't sound very NPOV
Most of this article sounds like it was written by a Constellation fanboy trying to prove that the competition really sucked, in all ways. I don't claim that the R-4360 was a huge success, but I don't think it was quite as bad as this tries to portray it. I.e. 'only profitable with government subsidy, unreliable, maintenance intensive, etc, etc'. Even if most of this is true, we could leaven it wit a little more positive stuff of interest. It was a good attempt at solving a tough problem, a lot of very brilliant engineering went into making it work at all. Most makers never came up with anything comparable. So it wasn't as successful as some engines...it was pushing the envelope much harder. It went out of service as soon as the turbine sowed up.....so did most piston engines, except the ones that could be operated very cheaply. The fact that econo-airlines operated the Connie and DC-6 into the jet age only proves they were pretty cheap to operate and buy. AFAIK ALL airlines relied on government subsidies to make a profit and to keep fares low. This wasn't some special deal worked out with the government to keep PW engines flying. While I'm at it, the R-2180 isn't a "derivative" of the R-4360. Both are engines drawn up to use the same new cylinder design as first used in the R-2800. I'm sure they had plans for a 14 cylinder smaller version well before they embarked on the radical 28 cylinder. The probably took out the plans for the 14 cyl version and dusted them off, doubling them to make a huge 28 cyl engine, because of the impossibility of cooling 4 rows of 9 cylinders. With all the brilliant engineers PW had, they didn't need to create a huge 28 cylinder engine and then cut it in half to come up with a 14 cylinder radial version of the engine family. That would have been in the works from the beginning. Radial engines are highly modular and from the outset the plan to build a whole family of engines using the same cylinder barrels. They aren't like inlines where the barrels have to be cast together into a block, etc. You can make any size radial out of the exact same cylinders. They started with an 18, but they certainly had a 14 in mind, and maybe even had been working on a 4-row, either 28 or 36 cylinder. In the end they decided 36 was too many. They could have done 7 and 9s, but they probably felt that unless a good reason showed up, it was better to let smaller 14s and 9s do those jobs.

70.20.33.171 (talk) 23:14, 8 August 2019 (UTC)

Specs R4360-51
In my opinion it is not a good idea to take this example, because it is a protoype engine and never entered production status. A lot of guys consider that an ordinary R-4360 has 4300 hp.....Further on -51 was not equipped with an supercharger or pressure carburettor. The design principle of the VDT was to recover as much exhaust energy as possible. Additionally the -51 uses an remote reduction gear box with an extension shaft and not less than 3 turbochargers to fit into the original pusher design of the mighty B-36. Very hard to explain for somebody who is reading the specs of this super special prototype engine........as i said not an good example METOPower (talk) 12:26, 1 June 2023 (UTC)