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Show WHAT WE ARE DOING TO WIN THE WAR. "Before this war is ended, I expect America to revolutionize warfare through the Inventive genius 01 this country and our great mechanical resources." re-sources." j The speaker was a well Informed member of the forest service force In Ogden. One of the lines alone which Amer-ican Amer-ican ingenuity is now working, with promise of success, is fighting in the air and. notwithstanding the great howl which wont up three months ago over the failure of America to do the Ht; miraculous in the air, the plans for a mighty war on wings goes steadily ahead on a scale never before attempted. at-tempted. An expert who has investigated investi-gated the Liberty motor declares the i machine is developing more power for ' its weight than any other engine now known, and quantity production is be-J be-J ginning to be realized in keeping with h the promise of a great air fleet. This statement is made 1 "The efficiency of tho Liberty mo tor is not to be questioned by anyone who has examined it thoroughly. It Wj'rj is far more powerful than any other airplane engine ever produced on ai Hjj quantity production basis. It exceeds in power all but a few experimental i HtJ machines. Although rated at 400 h horsepower it has shown on test as i highas 4S5 horsepower; and its 1 weight is 820 pounds " Bjr We have all heard that the Liberty 1 rv motor was nothing more than a Pack- I ard engine. Why this report gained circulation is thus officially related: With the outbreak of the war in August, Au-gust, 1914, Henry Joy, then president l E-ji' f the Packard Motor Car company. saw the importance of the airplane in war, and, looking ahead to the possi- 1 H. billty of the United Stales entering, i and, knowing how long it would take t H this country, without previous experi- i j ence in airplane production for wai f purposes, to get under way, he had his company start to develop an air- i plane motor. The first engine was j Hjf ! tested in February, 1916. Then a sec- HJt ond engine was made and finally a l third in April. 1917. At the opening 1 jjf of the war in 1914, airplanes had en 1 gines of 100 horsepower. Then quick 1 ly came, 150, 175, 200 and 250 horsepower horse-power engines. Vincent, chief engineer of the Packard company, and Hall of the Hall-Scott Motor company, were called to Washington in April. 1917. They immediately proceeded to plan an enpine greater than any in service. I It was felt that a motor should be designed de-signed so far ahead in power of anything any-thing else that had been produced that, by the time it could be turned out In quantity, it would still be well In the lead. Accordingly, a horsepower of between 350 and 400 was sought and tho size of the cylinders was changed from 4x8 to 5x7. Because of the larger cylinders required in the new motor, tho angle of the V was changed frorr 40 to 45 degrees. The larger pistoni and cylinders required slightly great or clearances. In place of the forcer lubrication of the crank shaft which was provided in the Packard englnr the scupper system was Introduced by , Major Hall, because it had been foune very efficient on the Hall Scott motor . These and other slight modifications I wore thoroughly discussed and decjd ed upon by the two motor experts. "It is interesting to note that the first experimental motor was delivered deliv-ered to the government on the 4th day of July, and the firt production motor was sent to Washington on Thanksgiving Thanksgiv-ing clay. This, however, did not mean that tho production problems had all been solved. No one except a man who has actually had experience with such work can realize the infinite amount of detail required In organizing a new industry. Usually, the organization work docs not make any showing at all to the general public, and const-quently const-quently is not appreciated. One of the ( ngineers of tho Ford plant told the writer personally that he thought every ev-ery one would recognize the right of the Ford company to an opinion on quantity production manufacture. He said that never in the world's history had a greater piece of work been done on a similar scale. The development of the Liberty motor was simply short of marvelous, and the public Instead of criticizing the manufacturers for slowness slow-ness should be thankful that they have had such competent men to carry on the work and develop a motor of such efficiency in so credibly short a space of time. "The motor which was delivered to the government on Thanksgiving day developed a number of small troubles One of these was the difficulty of lubrication, lu-brication, and eventually it was found necessary to change the scupper system sys-tem to the original forced lubrication system. But the most Important change was made in the production of the cylinders. In the first Liberty motor, the cylinders had to be bored from the solid an operation that was very costly in time and money. This however, was a copy of the best foreign for-eign engineering practice, and was fol-owed fol-owed as a necessary detail by our en- glnocrs. It was ai this juncture that the engineers of the Ford Motor Car company made a notable contribution. They developed a cylinder forged out of steel lubing, which enabled tho manufacturers to turn out the cylinders cylin-ders at very low cost and in exceedingly exceed-ingly large quantities. Seamless steel tubing is used, and this in but four operations under the forge press and bulldozer, is converted into a headed and flanged cylinder blank on which a minimum of machining need be done. I The manufacture of these cylinders I was not undertaken until the end of January and now they are being! turned out in very large quantity, Each week, the cost of producinc h- chn-ders chn-ders has been reduced sllghily, and all the savings made have been turned j over to the government. At the time the writer observed the work on these cylinders, the cost had been cut down more than half, with even greater economies In prospect. "Production of the Liberty motor is now proceeding at a very satisfactory pace. More motors are being produced than there are planes, to carry them. When the writer visited the Packard plant several weeks ago they were bring br-ing turned out at the rate of 15 per day and it was hoped that inside of two months a production of 50 per day would be attained "In the Ford plant, manufacture of i the- Liberty motor was just about to j start with a program of 100 complete engines per day when the plant is in full operation. In several other factories fac-tories work on the Liberty motor has either just begun or is about to begin, and certainly by the middle of the summer the Liberty motor ought to bo produced in very large quantities. The only thing that is retarding the airplane air-plane program now, is the manufacture manufac-ture of planes to carry the motors." oo |