Lancair Evolution Piston

"We had the power pulled back to around 30 inches of manifold pressure and were burning just 11.9 gallons while getting 206 knots groundspeed. Somehow, we had a slight tailwind despite our west-southwesterly heading — our true airspeed was showing 202 knots."

That's ridiculous. I'm amazed where we are with engine technology and efficiency. I think the best I ever saw in my P210 was 190 true on 18 gph LOP.
 
milleR said:
"We had the power pulled back to around 30 inches of manifold pressure and were burning just 11.9 gallons while getting 206 knots groundspeed. Somehow, we had a slight tailwind despite our west-southwesterly heading — our true airspeed was showing 202 knots."

That's ridiculous. I'm amazed where we are with engine technology and efficiency. I think the best I ever saw in my P210 was 190 true on 18 gph LOP.
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Engine tech and efficiency are about the same as your p210...they've just managed to make a fixed gear airplane slipperier.
 
Roger Roger said:
Engine tech and efficiency are about the same as your p210...they've just managed to make a fixed gear airplane slipperier.
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Not to be obtuse, but this thing appears to be a retract and roughly 66% more efficient going 5% faster. I get that suck/squeeze/bang/blow hasn't changed, but the engine control software appears to be amazing compared to gami's and an edm. 202 true at 12 gph is incredible in my book.
 
milleR said:
"We had the power pulled back to around 30 inches of manifold pressure and were burning just 11.9 gallons while getting 206 knots groundspeed. Somehow, we had a slight tailwind despite our west-southwesterly heading — our true airspeed was showing 202 knots."

That's ridiculous. I'm amazed where we are with engine technology and efficiency. I think the best I ever saw in my P210 was 190 true on 18 gph LOP.
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You can't honestly compare a P210 to an Evolution. A rough (real rough) way to figure out how much power is being made is to take GPH and multiply by 100. You were doing 190kts while making roughly 190hp. This Evolution was doing 200+ while making roughly 120hp. It's way more of a slippery machine.

With that said, I'd bet that this "next gen" engine (same basic engine, just electronically managed) is marginally more efficient. Good to see none the less though. Now if they'd just allow it in a production machine. The easiest reference to how much more efficient they are? Look at the last iteration of a Small Block Chevy. Between a carb, and EFI, all that really changed was the driveability. Power and fuel economy were almost the same.
 
mshunter said:
You can't honestly compare a P210 to an Evolution. A rough (real rough) way to figure out how much power is being made is to take GPH and multiply by 100. You were doing 190kts while making roughly 190hp. This Evolution was doing 200+ while making roughly 120hp. It's way more of a slippery machine.

With that said, I'd bet that this "next gen" engine (same basic engine, just electronically managed) is marginally more efficient. Good to see none the less though. Now if they'd just allow it in a production machine. The easiest reference to how much more efficient they are? Look at the last iteration of a Small Block Chevy. Between a carb, and EFI, all that really changed was the driveability. Power and fuel economy were almost the same.
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I'm in no way trying to argue that aerodynamics aren't a significant contributing factor. The 210 was kind of a pig, no question and one reason I got rid of it. I'm simply observing that if drag increases exponentially to airspeed then 17 mpg at 202 KTAS is pretty darned impressive and an efficient power-plant has to be a major part of that. Yup, it's a slippery airplane and they've found areas of improvement over the Columbia and previous Lancair's. Am I missing something here? Is this the expected performance from a piston single in 2016?

While I appreciate the comparison between carbs and EFI I'm not entirely convinced it's as applicable in the kind of environments and variable atmospheric conditions aircraft engines are expected to operate in.
 
mshunter said:
A rough (real rough) way to figure out how much power is being made is to take GPH and multiply by 100. You were doing 190kts while making roughly 190hp. This Evolution was doing 200+ while making roughly 120hp. It's way more of a slippery machine.
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Did you mean to say, multiply by 10?
 
milleR said:
While I appreciate the comparison between carbs and EFI I'm not entirely convinced it's as applicable in the kind of environments and variable atmospheric conditions aircraft engines are expected to operate in.
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Then I don't think you have an in depth understanding of an internal combustion engine. There isn't a whole bunch of room for improvement in "suck-squeeze-bang-blow" when you keep it in the same package. That's why I used the SBC analogy. With the opposed engine, you can't change much about valve angle, combustion chamber shape, port design, etc, which is why we've seen auto engines make such huge improvements since flat head V8's to OHV, to DOHC. The basic engine is still an opposed 6, with pushrod actuated over head valves, same port design, similar combustion chamber shape, etc. That's where big gains in efficiency come from, and they haven't changed that.
 
mshunter said:
Then I don't think you have an in depth understanding of an internal combustion engine. There isn't a whole bunch of room for improvement in "suck-squeeze-bang-blow" when you keep it in the same package. That's why I used the SBC analogy. With the opposed engine, you can't change much about valve angle, combustion chamber shape, port design, etc, which is why we've seen auto engines make such huge improvements since flat head V8's to OHV, to DOHC. The basic engine is still an opposed 6, with pushrod actuated over head valves, same port design, similar combustion chamber shape, etc. That's where big gains in efficiency come from, and they haven't changed that.
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I'm not sure how much Lycoming has modified this engine, but in the experimental market, yes companies are doing most all that. 250hp out of an io360 with bolt ons. Start changing heads/cylinders, cam, pistons and a bore stroke people put 300hp out of that engine. Which still isn't 1hp per ci so it's still a low output engine.
 
z987k said:
Do you know how hard it is to get 1hp per cubic inch in a naturally aspirated engine? Especially one as archaic a design as a Lycoming? They have changed little because of certification issues. Auto engine technology has changed leaps and bounds. But airplane tech is 40-50 years behind, still. They are just now introducing EFI, and it has to remain open loop because of lead additive. So it's still 1980's tech.
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No they've had it for over a decade. And no, it's not with modern tech. Which we have had in the experimental market for a long time.
I honestly could care less how long it takes lycasaurus to come into the 1980s. A certified airplane is a waste of money unless you're making money with it. Other companies are already coming along in the airplane engine game and they're going to put the hurt on anyone not innovating right now. Because by the time their stuff is certified, it'll be way too late. I'd wager continental will be gone first.
 
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