When he first started it, I subconsciously reached down to pet my dog and found that she wasn't even in the same room. With no load on it and that short exhaust, it really sounds like panting.
I fell asleep like four times during the video... Just wanted to clarify that the video was great but that damn engine could put a guy on speed to sleep.
When I was a kid in the 70's these were all over mid Michigan. Loved hearing the pop-pop-huf-huf-huf-pop echoing through the woods. The exhaust pipes used to be buried or just lying on the ground, sometimes the exit would be hundreds of feet from the actual pump.
I remember the sound of that engine from many years ago as a kid. My dad told us what it was but I had never seen one up close until your video. Yes for me I could fall asleep to that sound 😴
Always enjoy your videos. I was a engine mechanic for 32 years at my last job working on modern engines, but i prefer working on old engines like flatheads and early pre 1963 Chevy 6 cyl. engines. Being a old man now I just work / play with old small air cooled engines. Keep them coming. I have learned a lot about generators watching your videos. I am getting ready to start on my 1945 Briggs model B engine with a 800 watt Kohler generator. I also have a Onan Built Fairbanks Morse model 1B-7 like you had.
I never knew the term "hit n miss" was ment towards governing the rpms on these, I was always under the impression it was ment towards just how the engine fired and nothing more. Thank you greatly for the explanation 👍
What a treat! Loved every minute of this and am grateful for the excellent explanation of how it is governed. Thanks very kindly for making the effort to share this with us.
Your videos are great!! Your break down on what a hit and miss engine is, and how it operates is one of the best I believe I have heard. Your experience and knowledge with the type of old equipment is impressive. These old engines as well as others built during that time in our history were built to last forever. Those who like yourself are the ones proving this everyday. Thank you for keeping these wonderful machines alive and out there in front of the next generation to learn about and to get excited about how the mechanical systems of such things work, you my find friend may be that person who lites that fire within one or two of these young people that now has to have their hands and minds in an mechanical environment for this now has become their passion. Becoming the next engineers and or mechanics, who come up with new engines as well as the ways they are built. And who changes the Science itself on the way we think as to how we build . You never know how people like yourself touches others. When teaching or just taken the time to show and share with the young, when they have a question that after you answer it now becomes an hours long talk. Ever had one of those? I have. Ha, Ha, Ha. You and yours take care and may God continue to Bless you all.
I love it!. I play with old hit and miss engines and any other odd stuff I can find, I even have an old Onan 3kw parallel wound diesel, and an Ishihara 2 stroke rock drill/jack hammer, using three pistons, 2 connecting rods, one cylinder head, and a fuel oil mix squirter and a single spark plug! I'll have to do a RU-vid video on that.
That's some good quality work!!! Well done!! It'd be cool to have it powering something that you could bring to shows/meets... It's very hypnotic, watching the valves opening and closing, that exhaust valve catch popping in and out, etc,
Thanks Mike, that was great. Very interesting, and the mods made a lot of sense, but let me say, I would never have thought of them in 1000 years. All the best, Mart in the UK.
I found your descriptions/explanations very clear and thorough, and anticipated my questions. For example when you illustrated how the exhaust valve was held open when the engine reached speed, I was thinking "wow that'll waste fuel won't it?" Then you immediately described how the intake would only open under low pressure conditions in the cylinder... Anyway no rambling...excellent!
Always enjoy how you explain things. The hot tube set up is very interesting. The gas regulators and, accumulator info is great! Looks like you have your own little Jacktown Grove there. Good stuff Mike!
I love it. If you hook it up to a matching generator and run it from the residential gas supply you could make a 12 hour ASMR video for those who need it. :)
I'm just imagining this engine on "TheZachLife" channel, pumping away at one of his old oil wells. I can just see a nice Lufkin nodding up and down, and this engine just popping away all day long.
Glad to see you got it dialed. That hot bulb idea is so cool. Probably not as efficient as a spark ignition engine for that reason though. I'm guessing the well head guys weren't too worried about wasting a little bit of natural gas that they were going to vent to atmosphere anyway. Thanks again for sharing.
I bought a 54 Chevrolet book mobile and when I went to get it there was 14 of these in it and had been in it for decades. My son and I got all of em running within a week of getting them, the 14 are complete engines and I also got about 8 boxes of extra parts and 4 disassembled engines, I learned fast don't mess with the timing lol.
Excellent video keep up the great videos 👍👍👍👍it's very nice to see it running right I had figured that it was not running right I have seen them engine like that at steam threshing shows before here in western Minnesota
Nice explanation of this particular engine! This way of ignition of a gas engine is new for me. Know lo w and high tension methods off coarse, as this one with Oil engines. Chapeau!
Mike, I am really enjoying the video format you did here and in the last several videos. The explanations aren't oversimplified or overcomplicated and I am learning stuff, please keep at it. Also, I do like a hit and miss :). Sounds like a panting dog when coasting.
Mike, you did a beautiful job of explaining how that engine operates. I have a Kohler light plant which needs some attention hopefully someday we can get together. Chuck Copeland
Nice video, well done. Nice work on explaining the "double suck" phenomenon, and then fixing it. If I might try to explain what you were alluding to at around 17:20 in the video, you can look at it like this: a certain amount of mechanical energy is stored in the flywheel, as a result of its rotational speed; at the same time, certain amount of mechanical energy (also called "kinetic" energy) is _lost_ by the flywheel on each rotation. When the engine is freewheeling (operating without an external load), the only losses are to friction within the motor and to the air, which is stirred up by the flywheel's spokes and surface. The _ratio_ of the energy stored in the flywheel to the energy friction loss on each revolution is fairly low, so the amount of mechanical energy added to the flywheel by each "combustion event" is enough to carry it through quite a few revolutions, during which it slows down as its stored kinetic energy is (in a sense) "withdrawn." If a real load is attached to the engine, like a pump or a saw or an electric generator, the amount of energy lost to the load is much greater, expressed in terms of the amount of energy stored in the flywheel. Therefore the flywheel loses much more energy (and therefore rotational speed) per revolution, which causes the exhaust valve to be closed pretty much on each power stroke; there will be one combustion event for every two revolutions. In that situation, the engine is delivering its full-load output power, as you know. Any further load added past that point will cause the engine to "lose the battle," with each successive combustion event not adding enough kinetic energy to make up for that lost to the load; the engine slows down and finally stalls out.
Very cool Mike! Glad you got it all sorted out and running well! Would be cool to see it going some work at some point! I know you want to hook a generator up to it lol!
Awesome follow up video! Extremely good explanation of how a hit and miss engine works!!! Great diagnostics to find the problem! Keep up the awesome content! Dan @6-4_Fab Glen Rock, PA
very nicely done, Mike. Thanks for the update. I've never understood why people cn't sleep without noise, but maybe I should put the previous in a loop, and try it. Or not.
Thanks for a musikal moment in engine history , it sounds so great and relaxing to hear that enging run. I am wondering , a hotbulb engine dosent need to be heatet al the time , have you tested to turn of the heater and see if it continues to run without heating after it is started?
Reminds me of the days living near a very small oil rig in Southern California. The majority of them are nothing more than museum pieces now, but there’s still a few functional near the Long Beach/Los Angles harbor.
