Lycoming Clone

[Everwild]

I along with hundreds of others, am building an experimental aircraft called an RV10. It was designed around the Lycoming IO-540 engine. Most builders lament the monopoly that Textron Lycoming enjoys, the $80k price tag, and at the moment 18 month lead time to get your hands on one. FAA certificated engines are closer to $130-150k for the same engine with paperwork.

I understand that engine design and engineering is a very challenging endeavor, but given nearly 70 years of additional engine engineering knowledge, modern design tools, CNC machining, rapid prototyping, etc, what sort of investment would be required to essentially clone, and or improve upon the known weaknesses of this 260HP, 2750 rpm, 540 cubic inch dinosaur? Could they be done for less than $80k each in quantities of say 24-36 new engines per year? After all, they are basically beefy air cooled flat six VW bug engines.

Wouldn't advances in CAD, materials and CNC machining allow for a better and possibly more cost effective engine for something like this? Couldn't you outsource billet cases, billet cranks, billet rods and pistons, etc that would ultimately be superior to the 70 year old engines of past?

I'm not talking about reinventing here. Simply cloning with improvements in manufacturing and materials that wouldn't cost $80k-150k each.

 

[EdStainless]

You can get a Honda V6 certified for aerospace.
Dual ignition, dual fuel supply, and all of the certs.
It is in the $150k range.
The problems with aero are liability, special requirements, and very low volumes (compared to other applications).
Sorry, that is the real world.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
P.E. Metallurgy, consulting work welcomed

 

[btrueblood]

Everwild,

Ok, I had the details a bit skewed. Going back to my notes and looking up some details - the company I spoke of was actually trying to certify for GA use, an upgraded version of the Connie 0-200, using electronic fuel injection and ignition, plus modern ecu, plus certify for automobile unleaded gas. The engine I saw was an experimental version that they were conducting tests with. This was some 6-8 years ago. The company(s) still exist, though the effort to certify the engine appears to be stalled (the web page is no longer up), I'd have to go knock on their door and see what's up, if they'd even talk to me.

But yeah, I feel ya. The legacy engines own the market, and the barrier to entry with a new model is high, due to regulations, and likely the insurance costs for running an aviation engine manufacturing company. I do think the idea is workable, i.e. upgrade an existing design for better reliability and performance using modern technology, perhaps adding redundant systems if thought necessary. But a lot of aircraft manufacturing is currently circling the drain, the costs apparently are just too high. Experimentals, kit built stuff and LSA maybe...

"There are automotive shops taking engines, beefing up components and getting 5-10x the power they were originally rated for. I'm talking about taking modern production techniques to clone and or improve a platform to produce the same if not a slightly more powerful variant."

Yup, and people have been doing that for over a century. And people are buying them for racing, offroad use, and probably even onroad use with a emissions controls addition and proper ecu and testing. There are also people modifying current production engines, removing said emissions controls, and running them completely un-certified...and our state's EPA is cracking down on the shops doing it.