Starting the engine.
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — The Flight of the Phoenix
strntz — 13 years ago(October 15, 2012 06:15 PM)
Okay, I have not an insignificant knowledge of internal combustion engines, but I'm wondering about the engine starting in this film, particularly when Towns shuts the ignition off and fires a cartridge to "clean out the cylinders". It was great drama yes, and the interaction with Dorfmann was perfect, but it seems to me that shutting off the ignition would only cause more unburned fuel to fill the cylinders (assuming the flame front from the cartridge wouldn't reach the cylinders). But even if the flame front from the starter cartridge did reach the cylinders, there still would be no advantage to turning off the ignition, and no particular cleaning of the cylinders, or am I missing something here?
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lwi101 — 12 years ago(January 11, 2014 01:00 PM)
agreed, the standard way of clearing a flooded engine is choke all the way ope, throttle all the way open. the low charge velocity will not pull any additinal fuel from the carbutors, and clear the excess fuel. on old radials, they sometimes induced a backfire to clear excess carbon or a fouled plug. i always assumed thats what townes was doing, but i have no experience with radial engines, so i can`t comment on the procedure.
lou -
Adam60z — 12 years ago(January 18, 2014 01:30 PM)
The other aspect of this is that once the engine is started everyone including Towns and Lew jumps for joy, however they aren't even off the ground, and they didn't have much faith in the "toy plane designer".
For who would bear the whips and scorns of Hollywood (;-p) -
strntz — 11 years ago(July 21, 2014 03:57 PM)
doesnt make sense to me either. How would that little shell turn a huge prop.
I did some reading on the Coffman starter, and it was apparently very effective and reliable, so I guess we have to go on faith that it does indeed work.
And the engergy of the men seems out of place since they have been in the desert for so long and working hard.
Yeah, after that much time with little food, water and probably little rest, they surely did do a fancy jig when the engine fired. I guess we can say it was a last spurt of adrenaline.
It is bad to drink Jobu's rum. Very bad.
