Big Block Chevy powered Stewart S51 featured in a national magazine.

[check6]

The Big Block Chevy powered Stewart S51 will be featured in Hot Rod Magazine. Search 'hotrod.com' for the web article, the print version will be available in the September or October issue.

 

[plncraze]

Hot-Rod Warbird! P-51 Mustang Replica Takes Flight Thanks to Big-Block Chevy Power

Rod Bowers’ S-51 is a 70-percent-scale replica of a P-51 Mustang fighter plane. Its engine? An all-aluminum 540 big-block Chevy.

www.motortrend.com

 

[TFF]

Elliot Seguin has videos testing it.

 

[fly2kads]

It seems that an awful lot of work went into the engine development, with scratch-built PSRU and accessory drive. I'd like to know more about the ignition system they came up with.

 

[TXFlyGuy]

The propeller is off a King Air.

It has dual ignition, not electronic as in an ECU.

MSD is what they are using, I think.

 

[Monty]

It seems that an awful lot of work went into the engine development, with scratch-built PSRU and accessory drive. I'd like to know more about the ignition system they came up with.

Any older engine that has been popular with the hot rod crowd will have had dual points distributors produced at some point. All you have to do is use two coils, (one set of points, or an electronic pickup, for each coil) and a coil splitter. The coil splitter is just a couple of high voltage diodes. Accell, MSD, and mallory have all made them at various times. It's not meant to run both ignitions at the same time, but you have two ignitions. Or at least the most likely parts to fail are redundant. Just put an A/B switch, perform a run up, flip flop A/B between flights, and off you go.

You can also use dual MSD boxes and pick ups. Fairly common for dirt track and road race cars to use two ignitions like this (or it was back in the day before electronic ignitions).

Monty

 

[TFF]

Mags are required for top fuel by the rules. I believe they have everything modular and out of the distributor except the rotor and the trigger. Might have to look through some catalogs.

The article has a nice airy vibe to it, but I think that plane was in the works for 20+ years, and I think it was the dads dream project.

 

[Twister51]

Greetings from an S-51 kit owner. The plane you see in the online Hot Rod article is owned by a guy named Rod Bower. And, yes, it has had the test flights done by Elliot Seguin. You can find numerous videos of Elliot's on YouTube if you search for "Bowers Pony". Rod has patiently worked on his plane for probably 25+ yrs and, sadly, is now not able to fly it due to health issues. I am almost positive Rod's main focus now is to get the plane to OSH so he can rightfully show it off. His plane is a beauty and I'd bet a massive chunk of money he'll leave OSH with a Lindy award.

I occasionally see posts on here about the S-51 and questions about what happened to it. The short story is it was in production from 1994 to about 2000, then the company was sold by the designer, Jim Stewart, to another owner who dumped all his money into designing a fully-geared accessory drive unit but never sold any kits. Then the company was eventually sold again to two S-51 kit owners and, finally, one of the 2 bought the other guy out and is now owned solely by Bill Hudgens. It has taken almost 10 yrs for Bill to be in a position to start selling kits again but he is ready now to do just that. He has reserved a booth at OSH (booth #445) where he will have his own personal S-51 ("Beautiful Doll") on display as well as various parts he has machined as he built up his parts inventory. I know there are Mustang enthusiasts all over the world so please spread the word he is ready to start selling kits again.

If anyone has any questions I'd be happy to answer what I can.

 

[plncraze]

Does any body still sell the Stewart reduction drive? No money, just curious.

 

[BoeveP51]

Does any body still sell the Stewart reduction drive? No money, just curious.

Check out their web site http://www.stewart51.info/home.html

The last time I spoke to Bill he was going to make the PSRU available

 

[Twister51]

Does any body still sell the Stewart reduction drive? No money, just curious.

Yes, current company owner, Bill Hudgens, does.

 

[check6]

It seems that an awful lot of work went into the engine development, with scratch-built PSRU and accessory drive. I'd like to know more about the ignition system they came up with.

The PSRU is not scratch built. It was designed for up to 750 HP and put into production by Jim Stewart in the early '80s. This PSRU is currently available from Bill Hudgens' Stewart 51 Partner LLC, www.Stewart51.info.

 

[check6]

The propeller is off a King Air.

It has dual ignition, not electronic as in an ECU.

MSD is what they are using, I think.

This aircraft has dual plug cylinder heads with one set of plugs fired by an MSD electronic system and the other plugs fired by a Vertex magneto. The fuel injection system is an AirFlow Performance FM300 mechanical fuel injector. Totally "old school", once the engine is started, the mag, mechanical fuel pump, water pump and oil pump will keep the engine running without a single electron.

 

[check6]

The "hotrod.com" link lasted for about a week. Here is the archived link.....https://www.motortrend.com/features/p51-mustang-airplane-replica-big-block-chevy-power/

 

[piepermd]

The PSRU is not scratch built. It was designed for up to 750 HP and put into production by Jim Stewart in the early '80s. This PSRU is currently available from Bill Hudgens' Stewart 51 Partner LLC, www.Stewart51.info.

That website seems to be down…

 

[check6]

Just checked it at 11:00 PM, its up.