When it comes to making model engines Murray Lane possess an attention to detail that would impress any enthusiast.
The Howick resident has finally completed his model of the rare French Monosoupape aircraft engine.
He’s been building it “on and off” since 1993 and it’s taken a huge amount of time, effort and research to complete.
“They designed the engine in about 1907 and it was developed by the beginning of World War I,” he says.
“It’s a single-row engine and was in a lot of aircraft. It was one of the most-produced engines and it’s different to every other rotary engine because it’s only got one valve at the top.
“It’s still a four-stroke. The piston comes up for compression and it fires, it goes down and part way down there’s a valve still open up the top, so it’s sucked in a new charge of air.
“There’s a whole row of holes which can be seen in the model.
“Where the rich fuel mixture in the crankcase gets sucked into the cylinder, then it goes up in the compression stroke again and fires.”
Lane says he was initially going to build a quarter-scale model of the engine but decided to make it a third-scale.
“Then doing my research I found some photos of a two-row engine. They only ever made one and I don’t think it ever ran.
“So over the next 30 years on and off I’ve been building this engine. The information available is absolutely minimal.
“I found images and specifications in books and over a period of years I’ve got more and more information.”
The skilled model builder says he started off making the crankcase, which he machined out of solid steel. He then made its individual parts such as the crankshaft.
“In the early days I didn’t know what the centre-bearing looked like and just built it.
“Then I found a photo on the internet of the [Museums] Discovery Centre in Sydney and they had photo of it with front engine cover off so I could see all the gears inside.
“So I flew over there twice. Over the years I originally had 58 A3 drawings and since then I’ve probably done another 50.
“Over the last year I’ve done the auxiliary plate on the back. That’s got two magnetos, an air pump and oil pump.
“I spent about a year making all that and they’re all gear-driven.
“I’ve assembled the auxiliary drive-plate with all the various components on it and they’ll all rotate.
“The whole engine goes around the crankshaft and the internal parts work.
“It’s got a variable speed drive which I found from a couple of photographs in a museum.
“The engine is complete and it’s made of the same materials as the full-size engine.”
Now that Lane’s model engine is finally complete, he’s sent it to the Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre in Blenheim in the South Island so it can go on public display.
“It’s priceless and it’s going to go somewhere people can see it.
“It would be without a doubt one of the top five model engines ever made.”
