In this video, we look at the rotary-radial engine. We’ll see the Gnome with its famous valve in the piston. The monosoupape, which had a single valve and ports. And the Le Rhone. The latter was more efficient, although conventional. The former didn’t have a carburetor, only a pseudo fuel injector.
source.image: Repairman22
Three machines that dominated the skies at the beginning of the 20th century. One of them was commanded by the Red Baron in his plane. The Monosoupape , was a rotary engine design first introduced in 1913 by Gnome Engine Company renamed Gnome et Rhône in 1915). It used a clever arrangement of internal transfer ports and a single pushrod-operated exhaust valve to replace the many moving parts found on more conventional rotary engines, and made the Monosoupape engines some of the most reliable of the era.
The spark plug was installed horizontally into the rear of the cylinder at the top but had no connecting high-voltage wire. An internal-tooth ring gear mounted on the engine drove a stationary magneto mounted on the firewall, whose high-voltage output terminal was in close proximity to the spark plug terminals as they passed by. This arrangement eliminated the need for distributor and high-voltage wiring found in conventional mechanically timed ignition systems.
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This ring gear also drove the oil pump, which supplied oil to all bearings, and through hollow pushrods to the rockers and valves and also drove an air pump which pressurized the fuel tank. The later 160 hp (120 kW) Gnome 9N engines had dual ignition systems for safety, with twin spark plugs per cylinder which were electrically wired, with the wires routed onto the crankcase and a central pair of magnetos driven by the spinning engine crankcase.
