Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

I'm working my way through it, up to 1942 so far. I think it superb. Definitely one of those books.

A couple of minor quibbles: he doesn't know his aircraft to the same depth as his engines, and he is inclined to take Hives' comments as gospel (not always...). But this is the first reference I've seen to an Me409, plus photos.

Lots of praise for other details.

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

An excellent book in many respects, it gives insights that I would not get anywhere else. I would heartily recommend it.

The text jumps around too much for my taste. One minute you are reading about Schneider trophy race engines, then suddenly something about Bristols and then back to Schneider for no apparent reason than they all happened about the same time.

I have a feeling that it is essentially a history of the Merlin and its German competitors, with significant asides for the other makers and their engines, but the Merlin is very much the yardstick he judges everything else against

I wanted more though.

Italy gets a few mentions but nothing really concrete
France - not really mentioned at all
USA - only two engines discussed P&W R-2800 and Allison V-1710

Would have liked discussions about other makers - Wright not really looked at, P&W R-1830 from Wildcat not covered. Implementation differences in Thunderbolt, Corsair and Hellcat of R-2800 would have been interesting

UK - RR Griffon - disappointing coverage
Bristol Hercules - definitely wanted more (I know it was not a fighter engine, but it was a successful sleeve valve engine of similar power to the Merlin)

More of the engines in development as the war ended that went on to bigger and better things afterwards.

I do not know enough to comment on the German coverage, though it appeared to be quite good

Lots of lovely graphs from original reports, but reproduced so small that I need a magnifying glass to see what they actually say

Probably room for a second edition

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Calum has mentioned that he kept the coverage of the R-2800 to a minimum due to the existence of a very good book on it already (by Graham White). Ditto regarding the V-1710 (by Dan Whitney).

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Books by other authors

I do hate it when authors say, " I did not tell you about this because someone else has already produced a good book on it"

I will never know, as I am not interested enough to buy a book on just the R-2800 or V-1710 to find out how they fit into his thesis.

Martin

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Seems that you are not really interested in the topic then. No serious library lacks especially the V-1710 book.

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Not really serious on the topic. You could be right, but I was serious enough to splash out on this book. Is it too much to ask to tell me the whole story in one place?

My interest is in British engines and in particular their use in bombers.
There were only eight Lightnings in the whole of Bomber Command and only two of those belonged to the RAF. Bit rich to buy a book on the V-1710 in order to fully understand what is in The Secret Horse Power Race.

Any way there were not nearly enough accounts of combat operations and squadron life to keep me happy. A few colour side views of Spitfires would have been really great

Regards

Martin

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Thanks for the review.

What about the Jumo 213? How many pages deal with the 213?

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Perhaps I am falling to a very clever joke, but nevertheless: Did you really expect combat accounts and squadron life in a book written by an engine designer?

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

@Peter - attached is a photo of the index covering the Jumo engines

Re: The Secret Horsepower Race, Book Info.
 

Sorry, I can see my sense of humour is lost on you.

Martin