Print

[Ric Gillespie]

Subscribers to TIGHARNews emails will have seen the following notice sent out yesterday:

ARTIFACT IDENTIFIED

Subscriber responses to the October issue of TIGHAR Tracks and recent TIGHARNews emails inspired new research that has identified an artifact recovered during TIGHAR’s first visit to Gull Pond thirty-one years ago.

TIGHAR Artifact 1-21-P-1 was found with a metal detector and pulled from the mud just off the southern tip of the rocky island in
Gull Pond in October 1992.

TIGHAR Artifact 1-28-P-2, the small steel disk found
in 2021, remains unidentified.

Now preserved at The Rooms cultural and historical center in St. John’s, Newfoundland, TIGHAR Artifact 1-21-P-1 can now be reliably identified as a segment of a cylinder wall from a liquid-cooled internal combustion engine that pre-dated the first use of machines of any kind on the Cape Shore barrens.

The materials, properties, and dimensions of the artifact match a specific section of a cylinder from a 450 hp Lorraine Dietrich W12 engine like the one that powered l’Oiseau Blanc.

Exciting as these findings are, a word of caution is in order. Until the rest of the engine is found, the identification of the artifact must remain tentative.
The November issue of TIGHAR Tracks will detail the case for 1-21-P-1 being from l’Oiseau Blanc and how the new findings affect TIGHAR’s hypothesis and plans for the 2024 search.

****************

I'm currently writing the paper to be published in the upcoming TIGHAR Tracks and there's an historical question I'm hoping someone will be able to help answer.
XRF (X-Ray Fluorescence) analysis shows the artifact to be made of "12L14" steel.  It's easy to find the properties of 12L14 steel but, so far, I haven't been able to find out when that alloy was first produced. 
in testing hypotheses, we're always looking for disqualifiers. If 12L14 steel wasn't used until after 1927, either the XRF analysis is wrong (unlikely) or the artifact is disqualified as as being from l'Oiseau Blanc.

[Karen Hoy]

Have you tried contacting the American Iron and Steel Institute? 

https://www.steel.org/

Karen Hoy #2610

[Dale O. Beethe]

Looking forward to seeing how the research on that came about.

[Ric Gillespie]

I've connected with the Steel Institute.  The guy I talked to was fascinated by our project.  He'll try to find out when 12L14 steel was first used and call me back.

[Dale O. Beethe]

I've always felt the metal in that artifact is too thin to be a cylinder wall.  Could it be from the water cooling jacket around the cylinder wall?  (Assuming it had such a thing.)

[Ric Gillespie]

I've always felt the metal in that artifact is too thin to be a cylinder wall.  Could it be from the water cooling jacket around the cylinder wall?  (Assuming it had such a thing.)

Yes, there were water jackets around the cylinders, but they're still too thick and a fragment of a water jacket shouldn't have oil on it.

[Dale O. Beethe]

It's always seemed more like part of an oil sump or some such to me.

[Ric Gillespie]

It's always seemed more like part of an oil sump or some such to me.

My earliest idea when we first found it was that it might be part of the oil tank.  There was a 60 gallon oil tank immediately behind the engine, as shown in this photo of the aircraft under construction.  We don't know whether the tank was aluminum or steel, but the photo looks like either unpainted aluminum or painted steel.

[Don White]

I thought it looked a bit like a cylinder wall, but i could not come up with a very convincing theory of how it would blow up like that. It's just not a common kind of failure. This was a proven design and engineers knew how to build engines that would resist pressure. I came up with two rather weak ideas: 1) that the engine was forcibly stopped at the exact moment of ignition, so the full force of combustion had nowhere to go but through the cylinder wall; 2) that the overheated engine hit the cold water with enough temperature differential to cause the metal to crack (why you don't add cold water to a hot cast iron engine, or put your hot cast iron pans in cold water).

Has anyone tried taking this bit to the actual engine on display to see if it matches anyplace?

As for the type of metal, 12L14 appears to be the current American designation for a very old kind of steel, which has had other names in other times and places. In England it is classed as Bright Mild Steel, which is a common variety for machining. Knowing when it started to be called 12L14 may not answer when it was first made.

Don W.

[Don Yee]

I think that if the artifact is indeed an internal component of the engine then this changes the search in a meaningful way. How? There is likely no large chunk of metal lying around on the bottom of the pond to be identified by magnetometer (i.e., the engine came apart in a catastrophic way). Instead, there may be several smaller bits widely distributed that each need to be investigated. Although having a single large chunk of metal is likely easier to find in the broad sense, having multiple smaller bits (any one of which would possibly confirm the crash) actually raises the odds.

Don....

[Don White]

Early on in discussions of this artifact, I suggested it was part of the engine oiling system, which was largely external. That still doesn't seem to explain explosive damage. If I had my druthers, I'd take it to Paris and hold it up next to the engine on display looking for a match to some part there.

Were the cylinders cast with water jackets, or were the water jackets made separately and added around the cylinders? It appears the engine had individual cylinders rather than a cylinder block. The cylinders might not even be castings.

Don W.

[Renaud Dudon]

I share with you my reasoning on the subject. That said, it's just a non-expert's point of view...

For what follows, I'm going to refer to 2 documents:

the booklet “Information on the Lorraine 12 Eb 450 hp engine” published by the Centre d'Instruction des Spécialistes de l'Aviation - Ministère de l'Air. (School for training Air Force mechanics between 1916 and 1928.)

The article published in the July-August 1921 issue of “La Houille Blanche ‘1 , ’LES PRINPAUX ACIERS DE CONSTRUCTION”, by P. Dejean.


Today, standards for the quality and nature of steels (alloyed, non-alloyed, hard and non-hard, ductile and non-ductile, etc.) comply with standardized industrial quality norms. For example, US standard 12L14 is similar to French standard S300pb (European designation: 11SMnPb37 or 1.0737).

S' refers to 'Structure', designating steel for the construction of structures or objects; ;
300 refers to the strength of the material (yield strength expressed in megapascals);
pb' refers to lead.

I'm no specialist, but all this is harmonized via a unified system: the UNS. In the 1920s, I doubt that such international equivalents existed.

From the “Houille Blanche” article, we can see that in France, steels in the 1920s were mostly classified according to their ductility: extra mild, mild (Adx), semi-soft, semi-hard...

Subsequently, they were classified according to their mechanical properties, since this was the main concern in industrial applications. As time went by, the composition of the steel, the alloy, became increasingly important, particularly for the application of heat treatments. Nowadays, the content of various chemical elements is also indicated.

The interest of the “Houille Blanche” article is that it proves the classification in use in France in the early 1920s for the 14 “grades” of steel, for predetermined uses. However, these « grades » are only basic, not comprehensive.

Each forge had its own classification with steels of similar grades...

 
This document tells us that a steel called “semi-soft carbon” (class B) corresponds to a chemical composition mostly close to that of S300pb or 12L14. The phosphorus content is identical (.35), the sulfur content is very similar (.35), as is the carbon content (.15).

Track the others components is not an easy task since no standard classification from chimical composition didn't exist at that time.

To my great regret, for our Lorraine 450hp, I was unable to find any open-source details on the composition of this perticular engine's cylinders.

The manufacturer's service manual is fairly brief on the subject (page 17): “The cylinders, made of special steel, are machined separately and worked as a whole."

In France, at the time, the term 'special steel' meant steel generally alloyed with elements other than carbon and for a specific use...

We can only deduce that each cylinder is machined, milled directly, in the Lorraine workshop, from a steel 'ingot'. These 'ingots' must have been specially ordered directly from a French foundry (St Chamont, Le Creusot, Holtzer, Châtillon, for the best known...). I will try to find out which one was commonly used by Lorraine.
 
On the other hand, the leaflet “Information on the Lorraine 12 Eb 450 hp engine” gives a rather interesting piece of information (page 9):

“In semi-hard, forged steel, taken from the mass and machined separately.”

Now, according to the “Houille Blanche” article, a standard semi-hard steel had the following characteristics in 1920:

generally between 0.28 and 0.34% carbon content;
Phosphorus: 0.035%;
Sulfur: 0.035%;
silicium (between 0.10 and 0.60%).

Lead is not indicated.

Regarding french 'acier spécial' ratings, according to the “Houille Blanche”, there was another 'grade' : The 'F' or, « Mangano-silicieux' (Manganese – Silicious ally Steel ?) which was a typical spécial steel used for aircraft engine's cylinder :

« It is worth noting that this steel, which has been used  for a very long time, received a new application during the war, a new application which has given it a new lease of life. This was its use in aircraft engine cylinders engines. In practice, it was recognized that cylinders made in this way were better able to withstand the high temperatures  than carbon steels of corresponding hardness. »

I found others writings that  supports that statement.

Typical 'F' grade alloy steel composition was as follow (according  the “Houille Blanche ») :

Carbon : 0,40/0,60 %
Silicium : 1,6/2%
Manganese : 0,30/0,50%

However, according to other sources ( “Métaux et leurs conditions d'emploi dans l'industrie moderne, caractéristiques, essais” - Jean Oertlé, 1918), the more frequent use of this special steel used more manganese and less silicium, for reasons of brittleness:

Carbon : 0,30/0,60 %
Silicium : 1,00/2%
Manganese : 0,30/1%

If I understand correctly, in France in 1920, the combined use of silicium and manganese made it possible to use much softer steels for similar applications requiring strength, ductility and good deformation and temperature behavior. This brings us closer to 12L14. 


So it's not at all impossible that French forges and manufacturers were using special steels with chemical characteristics were very close to those of 12L14 as early as 1920.

For Lorraine, it's just a question of finding out which one...

Hoping this personnal guess could help a little.

[Renaud Dudon]

Here is the booklet “Information on the Lorraine 12 Eb 450 hp engine” excerpt i was reffering to.

LTM

[Ric Gillespie]

Renaud,  WOW!  Lots of great information there.  I'll start working up comparisons to the XRF data we have on the artifacts.

I have my doubts that the cylindrical artifact is 12L14.  The XRF software on some of the readings indicated "LA-C steel".  None specifically said 12L14 steel.  12L14 is just one of several LA-C steels.  All LA-C steels have sulphur and phosphorous and I don't see that in the XRF data.
 
It's remarkable that the booklet “Information on the Lorraine 12 Eb 450 hp engine” published by the Centre d'Instruction des Spécialistes de l'Aviation - Ministère de l'Air. (School for training Air Force mechanics between 1916 and 1928.) is handwritten.  The date is perfect, as is the July-August 1921 issue of “La Houille Blanche ‘1 , ’LES PRINPAUX ACIERS DE CONSTRUCTION.

The "special steel" question goes further than the engine cylinders. We have a Spare Parts Manual for the Levasseur PL4 and many components were made of "acier special".  Now we have data on what kinds of "special steel" were available at the time the engine and airframe of the PL8 were under construction.  If our artifacts match those data it will be a huge step forward toward proving we have debris from l'Oiseau Blanc.

[Renaud Dudon]

Hello Ric, it's a pleasure to talk to you again.

All in all, I'm quite relieved that you've clarified that the artifact in question may not be 12L14. Indeed, I didn't dare say it, but I felt that this alloy steel would have been a little too 'soft' to make good cylinders inner walls, especially of this size and with these constraints. It is indeed possible that this type of alloy would not have had the desired endurance.

I think so (but I'm not a specialist. I like mechanics, but I'm more of a 'book man') that the hypothesis of medium-hard 'manganosilicium' alloy steel is an interesting trail to follow.

From the XRF data you evoked, do you have the exact chemical composition of the artifact? (i.e. carbon, lead, manganese, silicon, phosphorus, other...) and the type of treatment it has undergone (quenching...). This could be useful for making comparisons with the different families of French special steels of the time.

Yes, I've seen that the PL4 parts catalog often mentions special steels. It's not surprising, since this generic term in France is a bit of a 'catch-all' (not sure for the translation...) for a wide variety of steels alloyed with other components and with specific properties.

I was lucky enough to come across this copy of the 12Eb mechanics' manual. I propose to copy it for you, page by page. It's going to take some time, as it's a vintage document. It gathers some indepth technical data about the engine.

Furthermore, I came across a reprint of a reference manual on the industrial use of metals in France (1918): “Métaux et leurs conditions d'emploi dans l'industrie moderne, caractéristiques, essais” - Jean Oertlé, 1918. It has been republished by the Bibliothéque Nationale de France.

And do you know what? You can buy it on Amazon!

For a complete oicture, here's a link to all the “Houille Blanche” bulletins:

https://www.shf-lhb.org/

Houille Blanche - Revue internationale de l'eau” is a French scientific journal published since the early 20th century by the Société Hydrotechnique de France. It's a scientific engineering journal focusing on the use of water as a source of energy and a natural resource. We're very fortunate in that its editions are now available entirely online!

LTM