K&B .40 with Left Hand Exhaust.

I can't find any information about this engine. It's got a K&B venturi, Dykes Ring, Ball bearing with Left Hand Exhaust. It has a serial number on the lug 0039061. Are there any K&B experts out there that can help me out? I went to the K&B web site but found nothing about left hand exhaust cases. Was this a counter rotatation engine? I havn't tried to start it but it looks to be in good condition, no plier marks or wallered out mounting holes. Inverted mounting with the exhaust toward the outboard wing?

Here is a picture of it.
http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dll?ep=16&groupid=141720&ck=

Thanks in advance.

John

Probably someone took the backplate and the frontplate off and switched them. It's easy enough to do.

>Probably someone took the backplate and the frontplate off
>and switched them. It's easy enough to do.
>
K&B sold them both ways. The earliest BB-shaft engines were sold with the exhaust on the "wrong" (left) side. They run equally well with the exhaust facing either way. I don't know when they accepted the inevitable and began assembling their engines the other way.

.
Kiwi

That was the standard hop-up procedure for these engines. K&B must have had some aesthetic or "product-differentiation" reason for making them backwards.

For years, K&B favored the left hand exhaust. All the Green Head 35's were left hand exhaust. When mounted on a Ringmaster the exhaust faced up. It was sometimes tough to find a helper to launch. (we didn't use mufflers back then)

This engine looks like a later model of the engine series that was introduced about 1961. I used a Series 61 35 for combat back then and the exhaust faced up. Great for priming in the exhaust for 1 flip starts.

I have been told that you can swap the front plate and the back plate to put the exhaust on the other side, but I have not tried it.

The early engines ran great, but were heavy and had fragile cranks.

Steve

(smiles) Thanks De, It's so clean that it didn't look like it had been "Worked-On". That would explain why the mufflers insignia is on the bottom. I think I'll leave it Flip/Flopped as a reminder of how much I don't know about engines.

Thanks
John Jolley:D

I purchased one of the K&B 40's just so I could turn the exhaust around and dump it out the right side of the airplane. It runs fine this way. The parts did not fit perfectly when I turned them around but only needed a minumum of work to make fit. No more burnt fingers tweaking the needle and a slightly cleaner airplane. I also opened up the venturi and took out the thick head shim. Turned it into a nice running engine.

One clue to me that it's been assembled back to front is that the muffler pressure nipple is pointing down. Reverse everything (including the muffler) and then the nipple will be in the usual position. If it was intended to run with the left hand exhaust then the chamfer in the conrod bush will be facing the crankweb.

I've run the same engine (this looks like a 4011) both upright and inverted, with exhaust on the outboard side, in stunt airplanes. No difference that I could see. I'm pretty sure I took the rod off and turned it over so it was on the crank the right way. I really like that the engine can be put together with the exhaust as wanted. The same is true of the series 75 35.

If it's got a Dykes ring, it's a 4011, if it's ABC, it's a 4050, converted to CL use. The 4055 is the Brodak version with a (lousy) stunt venturi and NVA through the set screw holes, and flats milled on each side of the venturi boss for the NVA to seat. The venturi on this engine looks like K&B factory, but not sure what engine it comes from...perhaps a Pylon Racing version. I couldn't get the front end off my #4055. The Series '61>'64 .35's I used in combat in the early-middle '60's ran strong (105mph on K&B 100 and full 9-8 Tornado... lotta torque), but the cranks were weak. The new front end design is much better, and would have made it a good combat engine back then. Just 30+ years too late. Steve