Why Explosive Motors Are Best
Internal combustion engines are best for airplanes and all types of aircraft for the same reasons that they are universally used as a source of power for automobiles. The gasoline engine is the lightest known form of prime mover and a more efficient one than a steam engine, especially in the small powers used for airplane propulsion. It has been stated that by very careful designing a steam plant an engine could be made that would be practical for airplane propulsion, but even with the latest development it is doubtful if steam power can be utilized in aircraft to as good advantage as modern gasoline-engines are. While the steam-engine is considered very much simpler than a gas-motor, the latter is much more easily mastered by the non-technical aviator and certainly requires less attention. A weight of 10 pounds per horse-power is possible in a condensing steam plant but this figure is nearly double or triple what is easily secured with a gas-motor which may weigh but 5 pounds per horse-power in the water cooled forms and but 2 or 3 pounds in the air-cooled types. The fuel consumption is twice as great in a steam-power plant (owing to heat losses) as would be the case in a gasoline engine of equal power and much less weight.
The internal-combustion engine has come seemingly like an avalanche of a decade; but it has come to stay, to take its well-deserved position among the powers for aiding labor. Its ready adaptation to road, aerial and marine service has made it a wonder of the age in the development of speed not before dreamed of as a possibility; yet in so short a time, its power for speed has taken rank on the common road against the locomotive on the rail with its century’s progress. It has made aerial navigation possible and practical, it furnishes power for all marine craft from the light canoe to the transatlantic liner. It operates the machine tools of the mechanic, tills the soil for the farmer and provides healthful recreation for thousands by furnishing an economical means of transport by land and sea. It has been a universal mechanical education for the masses, and in its present forms represents the great refinement and development made possible by the concentration of the world’s master minds on the problems incidental to internal combustion engineering.