enginehistory.org

[rhaus]

Anybody familiar with Wright Aeronautical's venture into marine engines? I found a reference to a 1925 vintage V-12 of 600hp ...looks like it has a dry sump, cast cylinder blocks bolted to the crankcase, and possibly overhead camshafts. Not surprisingly, it looks like a liquid cooled aircraft engine adapted to marine use. Was this a failed attempt or were these actually produced and sold?

thanks,
rh

[jfairchild]

The engine is likely to be the Wright 'Typhoon'.
Aerosphere states that the 'Typhoon', Rated at 550-600 h.p, was a marine version of the Wright T-3 'Tornado' aircraft engine.
The T-3 was apparently much the same engine as the T-2 which was built under orders from the U.S Navy for 'heavy-duty naval sea-planes'. It was to be a more powerful substitute for the Liberty engine.

I can't tell you how many were sold but I do have an instruction book for the 'Wright Typhoon Marine Engine' which is a third edition dated January 1931. The preface includes; 'experience acquired... through the operation of a great number of the previous Typhoon models... has been drawn upon... in the latest Typhoon'. Whilst that statement may be over egging it a little I believe it did see quite some use in the late 20's and early 30's for 'racing' use.

Wright also built marine versions of the smaller Hisso derived E-4, 200 h.p, and given the names Tempest and Hurricane.

[rneal]

A little late, but just stumbled across this post. According to Wright Aeronautical data, they produced 167 Wright "Typhoon" marine engines from 1925-1932, which they called the Wright Tm (T marine) engine.

The same material says they produced only 264 of the aeronautical versions of the engine, so the 167 marine engines were a rather significant part of the sales of the design.

Another point of interest is the fact that Auto Engine Works of St. Paul began, in about 1930, to purchase surplus Wright Tornado aero engines and marine convert them and sell them as Capitol T-12 Wright Tornado Conversion Marine engines. These would result in marine engines in direct competition with the Wright Typhoon, using their own engines in doing so. It was cheaper than the Wright Typhoon and no doubt did a lot to drive it off the market. I don't know how many of these engines Capitol sold, but i would not be surprised if it didn't approach the sales of the Typhoon.

The end result was that of the total of 431 Wright "T" type engines built, well over half probably ended their life as marine engines.

Bob Neal
_________________
Mr. Neal published books on both Packard and Liberty engines. He died on 20 February 2015.

[tmusser]

The book "Yachts in a Hurry" describes several 1920s-30s "commuter boats using these engines. If interested, I'll look them up.

[rneal]

Thanks for the update and bit of interesting history. I have the book Yachts in a Hurry - great piece of work. Note on pages 92-93 the boat Rosewill. It was powered by a pair of marine converted Packard 1A-2025 engines. this boat can be followed in Lloyds yacht register during some of its life and at one time it was powered by a pair of Capitol converted Paclard 1A-1237 aero engines.

Yachts in a Hurry lists a number of boats powered by various Packard and Liberty engines.

Bob Neal
_________________
Mr. Neal published books on both Packard and Liberty engines. He died on 20 February 2015.