Mite (oz13713)

About this Plan

Mite. Model aero diesel engine.

CAD drawings by Ron Chernich. Article by Bert Striegler.

Quote: "The Mite Diesel by Bert Striegler.

The Mite diesel was designed by Howard Manderville sometime in 1946 and was first advertised in the February, 1947 issue of Model Airplane News. Commercial production of this engine was originally carried out by the Eagle Manufacturing Company of Brooklyn, New York during 1947. The Mite was an immediate success and the Eagle production facility was quickly overwhelmed with orders. A separate organization, The Mite Distributing Company, was then organized to expedite production and distribution of the engine.

Eagle Manufacturing and The Mite Distributing Company were both operated by Walt Schroeder, one of the true pioneers of the model airplane industry and a noted author and editor. It is a little known fact that Walt was also the production manager for Ben Shereshaw's Bantam engine produced in Nutly, New Jersey.

Bill Seidler was hired as the production chief of the Mite operation. Bill was known as a master machinist who also had a lot of production savvy. Bill, too, is one of the real pioneers in the field of model engine production and design. Norm Rosenstock, another modeling pioneer, came aboard as an apprentice doing crankcase machining, but after a couple of weeks Walt asked Norm if he would like to move to the engine testing room. Norm accepted this new assignment and in his own words, said, "I ran and tested about 5,000 engines. Each engine was started and run about 3 minutes, and then hand started by me before it was cleaned up and shipped out. If your engine has a slight depression on top of the right mounting lug, then I had run that engine. The mark was made by the test mount that used a cam-lock to hold the engine in place."

Total production of the Mite Diesel was about 6,000 units. The engine was produced in 1947 and part of 1948 before it was overwhelmed by Ray Arden's glo plug. Several glo versions of the Mite were produced, but to no avail and production of the engine ceased in 1948. The remains of the project were sold to Mercury Models of Brooklyn and assembled engines were sold until supplies were exhausted. Thus ended the saga of one of the true American pioneer production diesels, an engine that in many ways was ahead of its time both in design and performance. The Mite is a handsome engine of modern appearance.

The Mite had a magnesium die-cast crankcase and fixed-compression cylinder head. The cylinder was leaded steel and the piston was hardened steel with a ball joint rod connection. The rod was steel, unbushed, and of circular cross section. The crankshaft was hardened steel and ran in a bronze bushing. Diesel versions of the engine had a tubular plastic tank attached to the backplate. Some glo versions were fitted with a metal tank. An unusual feature was a lever-operated valve on the bottom of the case that could be used as a cut-off or a throttle. Handled properly, the valve could be partly opened to bring the engine down to a slow speed without quitting. With the valve wide open, it operated as a cut-off..."

Direct submission to Outerzone.

See also: https://www.adriansmodelaeroengines.com/catalog/main.php?cat_id=142 for lots more history on the design and production of the Mite, more photos, plus engine test.

Note this plan (and article) is an extract from the MBI (Motor Boys International) Model Engine Plan Book, 2nd Edition. This was originally published through the MEN site run by Ron Chernich, see http://www.modelenginenews.org/. Also see Mary's page on RCLibrary https://rclibrary.co.uk/title_details.asp?ID=2122 which hosts a copy of the book as submitted from MBI by Ken Croft, in accordance with Ron Chernich's wish that from 2013 onwards the book should be available, freely, to everyone as a PDF download.

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