Baileigh Industrial employees have some very diverse interests, case in point, look at what Chris, Baileigh Industrial’s Head Engineer does in his spare time. Chris is an accomplished pilot and loves flight, so naturally the next step was building his own plane. Check out the first “flight” in this short video.
Here is Chris’ explanation of the project
“This airplane is a built from plans project, there is no kit and every part needs to be handmade. The airplane is called a Pietenpol aircamper designed in 1929 by Bernard Pietenpol. The original design is intended to use a Ford Model “A” 4 cylinder car engine. Although, I have 2 of those engines, I decided to try to find a more modern inline 4 cylinder with similar displacement and power as the model “A”. All of the car engines I looked at make all their power at too high of an rpm, so that led me to industrial engines, and that’s where I found the engine shown in the video. It is from a Mitsubishi forklift and makes all of it power at a very low rpm.”
Chris goes on to say, “I totally rebuilt the engine using modern race engine components, (ARP® studs, forged pistons, forged rods, ported heads, stainless valves, etc….) The engine was dyno ran several times before being mounted on the plane, and the engine makes 90 hp (the original model “A” engine made 45 hp) This video is showing the final test of running a very large prop which is most efficient and as you can see it worked real well pulling 280 lbs of thrust where 250 is what required.”
Great Job Chris! Keep us posted on the progress