REFLECTOR: Air intake

Reiff Lorenz Reiff at Lorenz.com
Thu Mar 6 13:20:11 CST 2014


Jack,

Last summer at Oshkosh, I went to the performance and drag presentations that James Redmon and Terry Shubert gave. I got there early and asked James what one modification on his Berkut gave him the largest performance gain. He said without question it was the belly scoop dedicated to ram intake air pressure.

The whole story (along with lots of other great info) is detailed on his web site. Specifically, see his write-up on his Clean Ram Air Modification here:
http://www.berkut13.com/berkut61.htm#cram

His cautioned me that the scoop helps a lot, BUT . . . you can't just stick a pre-molded scoop on the cowl and have it work. Most scoops have oversized openings, don't have the interior shape that allows pressure to build, and are poorly fared. To get a good performance boost, you have to figure out exactly how much air your engine needs, size the opening to match, provide an air expansion chamber, and shape the exterior aerodynamically. To achieve this, he removed the stock Berkut belly scoop and created a custom one in 2012.

Hope this helps!


Reiff Lorenz, Dayton, OH
Velocity XL-RG, 54% complete
Currently working on: Catching up on Reflector reading!

Velocity Owners and Builders Association
http://www.velocityowners.com<http://www.velocityowners.com/>




James Redmon's ram air belly scoop.

[cid:image003.jpg at 01CF3947.2EFD30C0]



From: reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org] On Behalf Of Jack Prock
Sent: Monday, March 3, 2014 12:12 PM
To: Velocity Reflector
Subject: REFLECTOR: Air intake

Hi,

I would like to know if anyone has any thoughts on air intakes. I am getting down to the last
few items on my list before flight and one thing I was thinking about was to put in an air intake
scoop under the engine cowling. Something along these lines:

[cid:image001.jpg at 01CF393E.840772F0]

Now my question, is for the people that have put an external air intake on the plane.
Do you get a boost at higher altitude because of the ram air effect? Does the drag of
the scoop outweigh any positive effect from the boost?

I have already started designing the scoop, but now have second thoughts and wanted
to see if I was going down the wrong path.

Any thoughts?

Jack Prock
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