But think it’s safe to say that, by the mid-to-late 1950s, some of the big radials had achieved a state of power and sophistication that reintroduced alarming levels of unreliability. Did the Stratocruiser engines fall into this category? If so, was that why the Stratocruiser failed to sell in large numbers, compared to the DC6s and L1049s? Bars and bedroom areas do hint that the cabin might have been too large in volume, but is it possible that there was a payload or payload-range problem as well?
The Stratocruiser piston engines were nearly at the top of the chain for complexity, topped only by the CurtisWright turbocompound series, which I also flew...on 1649 Constellations.
Excessive oil consumption was a rather large problem, but was overcome by a central fuselage oil tank, which could supply each 38 gallon engine tank.
Another problem was propellers...aircraft destined to Northwest were equipped with Curtis Electric props, which had hollow steel blades.
Corrosion was a
big problem with these steel blades, often originating under the de-ice boot.
Blade departs...engine departs...goodbye airplane, was the scenario.
Later on, all of these Curtis props were retired, and the fleet standardized with the Hamilton Standard aluminum bladed propeller.
The Stratocruiser was quite a complicated electric airplane.
The landing gear was electrically operated, and sometimes, during gear retraction, all engine driven DC generators would trip offline, the ships battery would then be not able to complete gear retraction...at this point, if an engine was to fail, continued positive climb would be impossible...in fact, the battery may well have been quickly drained of capacity with a failed gear retraction, then no power was left for the feather pump, to complete feathering of the offending propeller...goodbye airplane.
Hydraulic boost was provided for the rudder, and this was the beginning of rudder boost problems for Boeing...which later on carried over to the B707 and B737.
Not many were built mainly because there were not that many customer airlines that a) could have afforded to operate the beast, b)needed it for very long range flights, and c)had the expertise to keep this mechanical nightmare in the air.
Yes, I flew the piston-powered Guppy.
Can't remember the payload possible, but the airplane was restricted to 250 knots TAS, mainly to keep the quite large front end, just above the FD, from structurally failing...which it did on one occation.
A very big 'dent'.
Not pretty....
