enginehistory.org

[fbarrett]

Friends:

I'm trying to determine who was responsible for the design of the DB600 series engines during the 1930s. Fritz Nallinger seems to have been in charge of DBAG's aircraft engine projects in the 1930s and during the war, but was he the actual designer? Perhaps it was a shared "design office" project, but someone had to be in charge.

I've been told that Dr. Porsche was involved, but I tend to discount that because by then he was long gone from DBAG and had started his own design bureau. I can find no Porsche type number relating to an inverted V12, though he did design other large-capacity 32 and 16 cylinder aero engines.

I have the book Piston Aero Engines by Bill Gunston, but it does not name the designer. I am interested in this topic because I have just restored a 1960 Porsche Type 678/4 aircraft engine (based on the 356 engine) and am writing an article about Porsche aircraft engines in general.

Thanks,

Frank
fbarrett@aol.com

[jwells]

There are refences to this on page 95 of "Flugmotoren und Strahltriebwerke" by von Gersdorff et al.

eg, "Der F2 war eine Konstruktion von Arthur Berger (1879 - 1958)"

The F2 was designed in 1927 and the inverted F4 in 1931.

I have about a dozen patents pertaining to the DB 600 series engines. Most have no attribution to a specific designer but Fritz Nallinger is named in two and Karl Kollmann in another.

[fbarrett]

Jwells:

Thanks for your prompt and useful reply. According to one source (MTU), work on the DB600 series started in 1925, but the first real engine was the F4. Porsche worked at Daimler-Benz from 1923 to the end of 1928, so theoretically he could have been involved, but I've never seen any such evidence.

Frank

[jwells]

I've since had another look at the German reference I mentioned and I note there is a sentence which reads, "Die grundlegenden Entwurfe des DB600 und 601 entstanden auf dem ReiBrett von Dr Berger." which translates as, "The basic design of the DB600 and 601 originated from the drawing board of Dr Berger."
So, the authors of this book seem to be fairly certain that Arthur Berger was the designer of the DB 600 series engines.