"The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday"
Well... more of an idle Friday.
Today I was sat at the computer and I looked at the shelf next to my workbench, where I place my works in progress. One, a Griffon Spitfire, is currently wearing a a resin prop that I haven't glued into position yet. The blades are loosely held on with Blutak. Most of them have shifted and are slightly out of true, giving the prop a very odd appearance.
It struck me that every prop I have ever seen has the centreline of the blades aligned at 90° to and passing through the hub of the prop. It occured to me that if each blade were to be positioned with an advanced offset with respect to the direction of rotation, then the effective diameter of the prop would be increased without an increase in blade length. This would result in an increase in prop disc diameter and therefore (theoretically) an increase in power.
I cannot believe that I am the first person to have thought of this, so there must be some engineering reason why it was never tried. Or... *was* it tried at some point? If it was, the prop wpould certainly provide an eye-catching appearance.