Engines of Pratt and Whitney - A Technical History

565 Pages·2010·15.787 MB·English

by  Connors, Jack

The Engines of Pratt & Whitney
A Technical History
Jack Connors
Ned Allen, Editor-in-Chief
Lockheed Martin Corporation
Bethesda, Maryland
Published by
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc.
1801 Alexander Bell Drive, Reston, VA 20191-4344
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc., Reston, Virginia
1 2 3 4 5
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Connors, Jack.
The engines of Pratt & Whitney : a technical history / Jack Connors ; Ned Allen, editor-in-
chief.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-60086-711-8
1. Airplanes--Motors--History. 2. Aircraft gas-turbines--History. 3. Jet engines--History.
4. Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Group--History. I. Allen, Ned. II. American Institute of Aeronautics
and Astronautics. III. Title.
TL703.P7C58 2009
629.134¢35—dc22
2009036431
Cover design by Jim Killian.
Cover images from left to right: Pratt & Whitney logo, the R-2800 engine, George Mead,
Frederick Rentschler, Leonard Hobbs with the J57; courtesy of Pratt & Whitney, A United
Technologies company.
Copyright © 2010 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights
reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, distributed, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, or stored in a database
or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Data and information appearing in this book are for informational purposes only. AIAA
is not responsible for any injury or damage resulting from use or reliance, nor does
AIAA warrant that use or reliance will be free from privately owned rights.
PREFACE
Pratt & Whitney neither authorized me to write this history nor made any
comments on the manuscript. Pratt & Whitney’s only connection with my
effort is its generous permission for me to use material from their archives.
This book is a labor of love for me and about 25 other retired engineers who
have helped me with the history as seen through their eyes.
In 1950 Pratt & Whitney published a fi ne history of its fi rst 25 years in The
Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Story. My purpose is to provide an engineering his-
tory of the company’s piston and gas turbine engines that includes engine
descriptions, stories about the people who made the history, and how the engine
programs came into being. I have tried to use as many as possible personal
stories from the participants to put a human face on the engineering details.
There were two events in 1999 that coalesced to launch my effort. The fi rst
was a suggestion by retired senior Pratt & Whitney executive Don Jordan and
the second was an invitation from Dick Wellman, General Manager of the
Customer Training Center (CTC) at the time. Don Jordan asked me at a lun-
cheon with about 50 retired engineers to look around at all the aircraft engine
experience in the room. He said, “When these fellows go, nobody will ever
know what they did. Somebody ought to write the history of what they worked
on.” There was only one man in that room who was so naive that he commit-
ted to writing a history of Pratt & Whitney. Little did I know what I was
getting into!
Dick Wellman, General Manager of the CTC in 1998 was an aviation
enthusiast and had jurisdiction over the remnants of the Pratt & Whitney
Archives. After the original archives building was demolished, the contents
were bundled up for storage in the basement of one of the older buildings.
The contents consisted of about 1000 boxes and 50 fi le cabinets. There was
no card index fi le, let alone a computer-generated database or spreadsheet.
In 1998 Jesse Hendershot, a retired CTC instructor, volunteered to go
through each box and fi le cabinet to create a computer-generated card index
fi le for the archives. I joined Jesse in this effort the following year. Later Dick
Wellman provided an attractive home for the archives in one of his hangars
xv
xvi
and opened the archives for use by Pratt & Whitney employees as well as
aviation buffs.
After resurrection of the archives, at least seven years of research in the
archives, more than 20 interviews with the history makers, a couple of crashed
computers, several printers, bales of discarded rough drafts, and countless
hours of frustrated labor the book is complete. I am greatly indebted to Pratt
& Whitney for the privilege of unrestricted access to the archives. Without
such access, this book would not have been possible.
Jack Connors
December 2009
CONTENTS
PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
CHAPTER 1 PRE-FLIGHT BRIEFING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
How the Marketplace Changed Since 1925 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Pratt & Whitney’s Five Defi ning Moments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Pratt & Whitney’s Founders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
The Founding of Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Company . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
The R-1340 Wasp Joins the Navy and Air Mail Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
The Formation of United Aircraft & Transport Corporation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
The Break Up of UA&TC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Pratt & Whitney’s Great Contribution in World War II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
The Aircraft Gas Turbine Business after World War II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Rentschler’s Accomplishments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Rentschler’s Final Years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
CHAPTER 2 THE EARLY YEARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
George Mead and His First Pratt & Whitney Engine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Liquid-Cooled Engines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Air-Cooled Engines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Summary of Aircraft Engine Growth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
George Mead and the T-Engine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Mead and Willgoos Design the Wasp in 1925 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Mead Flies with Wasp on Mail Routes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Epilogue for George J. Mead . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
ix
x
CHAPTER 3 THE LATER PISTON ENGINE YEARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Hobbs Reveals the Secret of Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Succession of Pratt & Whitney Engines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
The Wasp and the Hornet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Roles of Wasp and Hornet in International Commercial Aviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Wasp and Hornet Engines Are Refi ned . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
The Contributions of Two Engineers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
CHAPTER 4 THE PISTON ENGINE EXPERIENCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Pratt & Whitney Flight Test Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
R-4360 Test Flight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
R-4360 Flies from Hawaii to Chicago . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
R-1830 Brings the Crew in Safely . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
R-1830 and Superchargers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Life as a Test Engineer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
R-2800C Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Controllable-Pitch Propeller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
R-2800-32W’s Rough Idle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
R-1830s and the Luftwaffe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
R-1830 Bearing Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
R-1535 and Howard Hughes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Boeing 247’s Wasp Engine Whine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Pratt & Whitney Engines with Fuel Injection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Liquid-Cooled Engines—Side Trip to Nowhere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Looking Back on Piston Engine Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Final Observations on Piston Engines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
CHAPTER 5 TRANSITION TO GAS TURBINES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Looking Back . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Beginnings of PT1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
PT1 Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Hobbs Moves to Gas Turbines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
PT2 Program Begins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
PT2 in the Lockheed Constellation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Two Engineers Rise to Prominence at Pratt & Whitney . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
xi
CHAPTER 6 WWII ENDS AND TURBOJET DEVELOPMENT BEGINS . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Pratt & Whitney Service Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Army and Navy Engine Training School . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Turbojet Development Begins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
American Companies Enter the Jet Age . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
European Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Pratt & Whitney’s First Turbojet Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
The J48 (JT7) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
CHAPTER 7 BIRTH OF THE TWO-SPOOL TURBOJET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Genesis of the J57 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
Meeting the Challenge of Creating Enough Propulsion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Concerns Regarding High-Pressure-Ratio Compressors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Technical Concerns of a Twin-Spool Turbojet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Air Force Approval for PT4 to JT3 Switch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Description of JT3-8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Description of the JT3-10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Soderberg Recommends a New Start . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
JT3A with a Wasp Waist Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
The J57 in the B-52 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
JT3 Commercial Derivative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Hobbs’ Refl ections on the Dawn of the Jet Age . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
CHAPTER 8 FOUR MORE TURBOJETS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
J75 (JT4) Twin-Spool Turbojet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
J52 (JT8) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
J91 (JT9) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
J60 (JT12) Turbojet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
CHAPTER 9 TRANSITION TO TURBOFANS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
Birth of the Turbofan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
T57/PT5—Pratt & Whitney’s Most Powerful Turboprop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
xii
JT10 Afterburning Turbofan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
JT3D/TF33—Turbofan Fever Fuels Innovation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
Three Programs Herald the Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
Suntan Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
CHAPTER 10 HIGHER AND FASTER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
RL10 Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
J58—Growing Mach Capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Liquid Air Condensing Engine (LACE) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
Florida Research & Development Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
CHAPTER 11 GOING COMMERCIAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Origin of the TF30 (JTF10A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
JT8D—Feet First into Commercial Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
40 Years in Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 366
CHAPTER 12 CHALLENGES AND NEW TURBOFANS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Supporting Activities for Changing Times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Developing Space Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373
Developing New Engine Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
Supersonic Transport Engine Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
F100—The Ultimate Military Engine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382
The Great Engine War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
The Battle Won . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
CHAPTER 13 HIGH-BYPASS FANS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
Light Weight Gas Generator (LWGG) Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
C-5 Engine Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399
Path to the JT9D Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403
JT9D Program for Boeing’s 747 Begins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
JT9D Engine Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409
xiii
Synopsis of the First 16 Months in the Air . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
Evolution of the JT9D Family . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 415
Adventures in Marketing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 417
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 424
CHAPTER 14 THE MODERN ERA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
JT10D Path to the PW-2037 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
Evolution of the B-757 and PW2037 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 434
International Aero Engines (IAE) and the V2500 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
PW4000 Series of High-Bypass Engines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 442
Engines Following the PW4000 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
PW6000 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
What Became of the F100? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451
F119—Advances in Engine Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 452
Integrated Product Development (IPD) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 458
Thrust Vectoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 463
F135—How Times Have Changed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 464
PW1000G . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
Advances in Engine Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 472
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 472
CHAPTER 15 LOOKING BACK 80 YEARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
Aviation in History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
Collier Awards as Overview of Aviation History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
Piston Engine Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
Gas Turbine Engine Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
Progress in Airframe Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 478
Airframe’s Demand for Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481
Progress in Engine Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483
Progress in Engine Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 492
Then and Now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 496
Pratt & Whitney’s Finest Moments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 496
Rentschler’s Legacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 500
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 502
APPENDIX PRATT & WHITNEY MEDALLION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503
AFTERWORD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 505
Early Infl uences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 505
Early Days at Pratt & Whitney . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 506
Engine Reliability —The Key to Commercial Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
xiv
Propulsion Paradigm Shift . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
Meeting the Inventors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 508
Golden Eagles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 510
Closing Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 511
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 513