Rolls-Royce Continental O-300

The Continental O-300 and the C145 are a family of air-cooled flat-6 aircraft piston engines built by Teledyne Continental Motors.Christy, Joe: ''Engines for Homebuilt Aircraft & Ultralights'', pages 60-63. TAB Books, 1983.

First produced in 1947, versions were still in production . It was produced under licence in the United Kingdom by Rolls-Royce in the 1960s.

Development

The C-145 was developed from the C-125 engine. Both powerplants share the same crankcase, although the C-145 produces an additional through a longer piston stroke, higher compression ratio of 7.0:1 and different carburetor jetting.

The O-300 is a modernized C-145 and retains the same weight, dimensions, bore, stroke, compression ratio, displacement and output power of the earlier engine.

GO-300

The GO-300 employs a reduction gearbox, so that the engine turns at 3200 rpm to produce a propeller rpm of 2400. The GO-300 produces whereas the ungeared O-300 produces .

The GO-300 engine has a TBO (Time Between Overhaul) of 1200 hours, while 1800 hours is the standard for ungeared O-300 engines. The GO-300 engine suffered reliability problems as a result of pilots mishandling the engine and operating it at too low an engine rpm. This caused the Cessna Skylark to develop a poor reputation for engine reliability. Many Skylarks flying today have been converted to different, larger-displacement, direct-drive engines.

Variants

;C145
:Six-cylinder, , direct-drive engine.
;C145-2:
;O-300
:Modernized C145, , direct drive engine.
;O-300-A
:
;O-300-B
:
;O-300-C
:
;O-300-D
:
;O-300-E
:Limited production for the Beagle B.218X twin that never went into productionFlight Global, 21 March 1963, p. 399
/ref>
;GO-300
:Geared O-300, at 3200 crankshaft rpm, 2400 propeller rpm.
;GO-300-A
:
;GO-300-C
:
;GO-300-D
:
;Voyager 300
:Liquid-cooled, fuel-injected version developing at 2,700 rpm.
;Rolls-Royce-Continental O-300:Licence production in the United Kingdom.

Applications

O-300

* Aeronca Sedan
* Baumann Brigadier
* Cessna 160 - intended for production model
* Cessna 170
* Cessna 172 and T-41 Mescalero
* Maule M-4
* Meyers MAC-145
* Taylorcraft 15
* Temco TE-1A

GO-300

* Cessna 175
* Goodyear GZ-19 and GZ-19A

Voyager 300

* Alexeev Strizh

Specifications (O-300)

Reference: ''Engines for Homebuilt Aircraft & Ultralights''

See also

References

{{US military piston aeroengines

Boxer engines
1940s aircraft piston engines
O-300