Canovetti Turbine.

[klem]

At the beginning of aviation at a time when the propeller was evolving slowly, some visionaries submitted Precaucous ideas to existing technology, such as Henri Coanda or the Italian Cosimo Canovetti, trained as a civil urban planning engineer, he collaborated with Baron Haussmann , developer and transformer of Paris and participated in the construction of the Opera district in Paris. However, his real passion was aerodynamic studies and jet propulsion, to which he devoted himself by developing his turbine: "it is a gasoline combustion engine without a transmission shaft, used only as a generator of hot gases under pressure, that is as a volumetric compressor. Canovetti makes efficient the jet of gases through the exhaust pipe by using them to move a turbine that transmits rotary energy to a large propulsion propeller". The device had a low efficiency and both in France and in Italy the potential of the invention was underestimated. But the founding principle of the turboprop was there and many consider Canovetti's device as the first turboprop in Italy or in the world.

 

[Nicknick]

So he increased the back pressure of the poor little air cooled engine, until it gave no more power at the crank shaft. With such an high beck pressure, the engine will surly start to knock and pre ignite due to the large amount of hot residual gases. A Diesel engine would have been a better choise, because it can handle much higher back pressures without combustion problems (see my thread about a Diesel Turbocoumpound Fandrive).

 

[publiusr]

https://flic.kr/p/91XQzg

View: https://www.flickr.com/photos/tossmeanote/5261748705

—below 20,000 feet