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When
Dyna-Jet engine in new or like-new
condition is listed for sale or auction on
eBay, it usually sells for north of $500. Sometimes buyers get lucky and win
an auction for less. This 1946 Popular Science magazine article entitled
"Baby V-1 Flies for Fun" appeared just a year after Germany had surrendered unconditionally.
Only a year before that, Londoners ran for cover in underground shelters when
V-1 "Buzz Bombs" (referred
to here as the portmanteau "robomb" - robots+bomb - here) were heard making their
tell-tale 45 Hz "buzz" (or clacking) noise as they made their way toward England.
"V-1" was from the German Vergeltungswaffe 1
meaning "Vengeance Weapon 1."
The only reference to a "robomb" (other than for the Super Mario game) I see other
than this article is from a 1944 issue of Time magazines entitled, "Science:
How the Robomb Works." As Paul Harvey would famously say, "Now you know... the
Rest of the story."
Baby V-1 Flies for Fun
Tiny jet built to power models drives toy car 150 miles an hour
The same kind of a pulse-jet engine that poured winged bombs - V-1s - on England
in 1944 has now been reproduced in miniature to power model airplanes, automobiles
and boats. The inventors, William L. Tenney and Charles Marks of Minneapolis, have
shrunk the Nazi engine to toy size. For its measurements, it probably is the most
powerful package of energy ever produced. It will drive a miniature automobile,
for example, 150 miles an hour.
The 12-foot Nazi jet produced a "thrust" of 600 pounds. The 21-inch baby jet
supplies a thrust of three pounds when not moving, more than that when movement
rams air through the spring shutters in its nose. Tenney states that his company,
Aeromarine, can go the Nazis one better by producing from 600 to 800 pounds of thrust
with an engine less than three feet long and 16 inches in diameter. The V-1 power
unit was 22 inches in diameter.
In larger sizes, the inventor believes, this "Dyna-jet" could be used to drive
full-scale airplanes, racing cars and boats. He foresees its use as a "life preserver
of the air," supplying power for air transports in case of engine failure. It could
also, he says, afford extra bursts of speed for fighter planes and for the take-off
of heavy planes.
The "Dyna-jet" tube holds only six ports, made of stainless and
spring steels and aluminum.
A bicycle pump supplies the tiny jet, mounted on a toy car, with
compressed air for starting.
Tiny jet built to power models drives toy car 150 miles an hour.
The baby jet engine is simple, light, powerful - and can be held
safely. A flame a few inches long does issue from the thrust pipe but beyond the
flame's tip the heat is dissipated rapidly.
Inventors Tenney and Marks confounded their critics, who predicted
the jet engine would burn fingers and ignite model planes and boats, by wrapping
it in balsa wood.
The "Dyna-jet" consumes fuel, from a household
oil can, at the rate of two to three ounces minute; operates from 12 to 15 seconds
on it.
Like the original jet on the robomb, the "Dyna-jet" is economical of parts. And
only one of them - the shutters that alternately receive and shut off the entrance
of air in the combustion chamber - moves. The entire assembly weighs only a pound.
Its fuel is gasoline, kerosene or stove oil.
Like the big jet, it uses compressed air, but for a different reason. The robomb
contained two cylindrical bottles of compressed air to drive three gyroscopes that
governed its flight. The "Dyna-jet" uses compressed air to provide a combustible
mixture in the firing chamber to start the engine. Both jet engines use a spark
plug for ignition.
There is another marked difference between the two engines. The robomb's engine
pulsed at a rate of about 45 times a second. The baby jet pulses up to 250 times
a second.
It was test flown in Dayton, Ohio, in March, but prior to that had driven miniature
racing cars and boats.
Posted August 24, 2024
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