JUST ARRIVED: cox babebee049

RknRusty wrote:That sounds like a W glow element. Cox used them in some product engines, I believe. I learned that from our collectors here. I have one. Plugged it in yesterday and it lit up just fine.

Cox produced them in short runs in the 80's. It was more of a cost cutting expenditure than trying to increase engine performance. They had lower compression than standard heads, which lead to a lower idle so they were shipped out on some RC engines. They often burn out prematurely. Either Bill Atwood (which is ironic because he helped with the .010) or Holland Engines who won the ensuing patent over the "W" design.

I have one on a Fokker D-7 engine, I wonder how much it is worth. Works fine. I recall seeing one on Ebay for $40, never sold...

In the dark.

Thats the glowhead alright, and I thought the cavity for the element looked a bit large consequently figured it was a low compression deal, oh well.

She is gooped upretty tight, I put a prop on her, she won`t budge after an alcohol soak, time for some solvent.

I`m glad it has the metal backplate, the plastic ones didn`t hold up to harsh ,nose bumping landings and this one goes on the boys "spad" plane.

Have you got any pics?

Here's what Mudhen said, I think its worth rereading:

Although I can’t be 100% sure, I don’t think the “W” element glowhead was discontinued because of patent infringement. Follow me:
The following information is related directly from Cox “Engineering Change Letters/Order,” (“ECL’s, or “ECO’s.”) ECL/O’s are a great source of information, though not the only source, because they come straight from inside the company. The letters are dated, numbered, signed, and each provides a brief, written description of the work carried out by Engineering.
Beginning June 22, 1971, Cox began work on a “Cam Roller Starter Assembly” for the “350-9” Babe Bee engine intended for the “Rivets” model airplane. Several ECO’s describe changes and modification to the starter until 7/12/1972. This ECO notes, “Clutch type starter assy to be discontinued as per Bill Selzer memo dated 7-10-72.” The letter also notes the remaining starters are “total scrap” costing the company $15, 665.08. A hand-written breakdown of the losses is attached to the ECO. I don’t have the “Bill Selzer memo” but a little digging in fact reveals the patent infringement with Wen-Mac, (or Testors, or AMF, not really sure.) The point is that work was immediately halted and the remaining stock was scrapped. This would be consistent if Cox were ordered to “cease and desist.”
The “W” element glowhead – I searched the U.S. Patent database for a “W” element glowplug/head and found nothing. That’s not to assert it wasn’t patented, I just couldn’t find anything. On July 31, 1969, the ‘“W” Glow Plug (short reach)’ ECL indicates that the “W” element glow plug was released and scheduled for production. I heard it was Cox engineer Bruce Paton who came up with the idea for the element, but that Bill Atwood actually designed it. This particular ECL is signed, “Wm E Atwood.” On 10/31/69, the “witness mark,” or groove, was added to the upper cooling fin. 3/28/72 – the witness mark was removed. The former stock of coil filaments was depleted so the mark was no longer required for identification. 11/17/72 – The ECO reads, “ 302-5 ‘Coil’ filament will replace 271 ‘W’ filament as soon as stock is exhausted.” The point here is that if it were patent infringement, then a “cease and desist” order would have been issued. Rather than waiting until “stock is exhausted,” Cox would have been forced to scrap the stock and take the losses, similar to the rewind starter debacle.
Anyway, I don’t think it was patent infringement. It may have been an attempt to reduce cost. If the “W” element was less successful because of reduced engine performance, then it makes sense why Cox returned to the coil filament.

Thanks for the info, basically as I assumed except for the timeframe, I had never seen one before which lead me to believe it was newer.

Crank is still pretty tightly (way too much to turn by hand) gummed up, sitting with sovent in her now, the prior alcohol soak did nothing at all.

Heat will do more to free the engine than any solvent could. I use a monokote heat gun to free up engines I get that are completely frozen. Remove the backplate or tank if you can. Put on an old prop. Heat the cylinder and the crankcase untill you start to see a little smoke. Put on some heavy leather gloves and hold the engine in one hand and work the prop back and forth with the other hand. Works every time and I can have a frozen engine completely freed up and dissambled in a matter of minutes.

Once the engine is free and apart I soak all the parts in old glow fuel. I use a small plastic container with a lid. Always completely sumberge the aluminum parts in the glow fuel or nasty corrosion will result where the part is exposed to air. Learned this the hard way on a TD crank case.

This is how I freed up my stuck Olympic rear drum valve engine.

Yep, heat is our friend. but for cleaning you need a solvent.

Alcohol might be ok for a quick clean-up, but should never be used for soaking parts.

I'm not a big fan of soaking any metal part in alcohol. I cringe when I hear people use rubbing alcohol (20-30% water) Years ago I discovered how well brake fluid removes gunk, until I left a engine in some for several days, it was amazing how corroded it was. Brake fluid absorbs moisture like a sponge and I believe alcohol does too.

Jason_WI wrote:...I soak all the parts in old glow fuel. I use a small plastic container with a lid. Always completely sumberge the aluminum parts in the glow fuel or nasty corrosion will result where the part is exposed to air. Learned this the hard way on a TD crank case...

I lost a bowl full of Bee crankcase assemblies like that.

I didn`t let the alcohol soak go on long, no harm done.
I was tempted to just pull the crank out for a real cleaning;Since the channel locks I just used to finally get her to turn even a little bit; after I broke a grey cox comp. prop trying to turn by hand. Yes, I did it, against my rule , but I still did it. I`m

wondering if someone ran high nitro(low lube) heli fuel and the crank was heat siezed in the case?
I figure if its that tight the slot that lube travels in within the crankcase for crankshaft lube must need to be cleaned manually on this engine

Speaking about cleaning engine parts and so on, 91% isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol will be a great cleaner and yes as long as the entire part is submerged and when removed wiped down instantly, no corrosion will occur. Hoppe's #9 is a great cleaner to remove the tough baked on stuff. I have a jar of 10w oil that I dip the cylinder and piston assemblies and the crankcase assemblies in before I assemble the engines to oil up all the parts (may be overkill but it has always worked for me). Anyway, I will sometimes toss all the engine parts into the jar for a few days to a week. After I pull them out, I would wipe all the parts down and they would look great! I only had one person (a retired science teacher) tell me that it is actually doing more harm then good to do that but I really didn't think he knew what he was talking about. If you have a plastic backplate, then maybe leave that out although I have never had a problem when I would occasionally drop a really dirty plastic backplate into it for awhile. The only cleaners I have had problems with was some "professional" parts cleaner from an auto parts store. It think it was called Mega-Solv. It said NOWHERE on the bottle that it would etch the aluminum, in fact, it said BEST for cleaning aluminum engine parts! I only let the parts sit in it for about 15 minutes (bottle suggests 1-2 hours for really dirty parts and dissolving old gaskets). I came back, those parts sure shined up and looked great, I sat the dried-wiped down parts on my bench. I came back to them the next day, I noticed they had formed a very fine but rough dull white finish that wouldn't wipe off with any type of cleaner. I remember drying the parts COMPLETELY with some clean shop rags before setting them down and leaving the for a day. So I took that bottle of parts washer and gave it to a friend who does a lot of automotive work for friends and other people. I told and showed him what it did and he just said "who cares, it made them clean didn't it? It wouldn't harm the car engine parts". So before trying any new cleaners, I suggest you test it out on some junk parts or scrap aluminum to see what it does first. Actually, you could probably just search Google "Hoppe's #9 damages aluminum" or something like that to see if anything comes up about the cleaner you are planning on using.

I find the best thing to soak the engines in to be the very same fuel we run them on because it is high. Ktro ad also lubricates the engines well and means you can just assemble them and run them again without having to lube them separately.
Indra

Mark Boesen wrote:Yep, heat is our friend. but for cleaning you need a solvent.

Alcohol might be ok for a quick clean-up, but should never be used for soaking parts.

Alcohol is very hydroscopic, so much so that mixing equal amounts of alcohol and water yields approximately 96% of the combined volume of the two. That's one reason we should leave our fuels exposed to the open air as little as possible.

If I have to resort to soaking engine parts, I use either acetone or penetrating oil, never alcohol. If I anticipate having to heat the engine, I use penetrating oil. It may take several heat/soak cycles to free it up -- the heat helps the oil continue to seep into areas that may be locked or blocked.

On bearings on farm equipment, I've heated with a propane torch until the oil started to burn. On model engines, I generally use a monokote gun -- the heat is not that high, but still sufficient to soften gummed castor and allow the penetrating oil to do its job. I use only moderate hand pressure -- if that doesn't work, it goes back into another soak/reheat cycle. The rod and ball joints on these engines are too fragile to apply much pressure without taking the chance of damage.

Soak/heat; soak/heat, ..... A good solvent and heat gun usually works for me.