BIG ENGINES IN SMALL SCALE

But first small introduction to Mr Olsryd himself. His career as an engines constructor goes back
as far as to the beginning of 1930, when he competed and won several motorbike-races.
In those days a driver had to know his engine from inside and out side in order to have a chance
to succeed.

In Sweden Mr Olsryd became famous after constructing a 9-cylinder Wright J-5 "Whirlwind"
radial engine in scale 1:4.

The project began when an enthusiastic group of people from Gråbo (Sweden) model plane club,
together constructed a 1:4 scale model of Mr. Charles Lindberg's plane, The Spirit of St Louis.
This was the plane that was used in the first solo flight over the Atlantic ocean in 1927.

The model was supplied with a 50 cc converted chain saw engine, which gave the plane a rather
good flying capacity althought a bit sluggish.

Despite cylinder dummies, something aesthetically was not correct with the model.
After having studied the model for a while, the group came to the conclusion that it was the big
cylinder top with its ignition plug that was awkwardly pointing straight up out of the tastefully
rosetgrounded nose

Karl-Erik Olsryd was contacted and brought into the project. He had previously both constructed
and built everything from one cylinder up to 18 cylinders working engines.
For him it was a challenge construct a functioning 1:4 scale model of the 9-cylinder
Wright Whirlwind J50 engine on 200 Hp the same one as the Spirit of St.Louis was equipped with.