The room became very still; all kidding had fled right out the window. Chance had passed the buck right back to the Engine Section; he’d written the prescription for a new power plant. And furthermore we realized he was absolutely right in his choice of size; the Wright 200 air-cooled, which by now was being called the “Whirlwind,” was only a zephyr. The Wright 400-hp P-2, later named the “Cyclone,” was overweight for Chance. Something about halfway between seemed to be the answer, and Chance had called the turn. The catapults on the battleships and cruisers, together with their hoisting gear and other equipment, had been designed to handle a limited weight, and this, in turn, controlled the size of our new airplane. The weight of the engine determined the final all-up weight of the aircraft, and the power output was dictated by the necessity for getting the plane up to flying speed before it reached the end of the catapult. And while there was no such limitation on aircraft carriers, like the new _Lexington_ and _Saratoga_, then building in the shipyards, the over-all size of the airplanes would determine the number each carrier might line up on her flight deck. The Vought prescription would also lead to a new type of fighter, smaller than anything around the P-2 but with higher performance. Better still, Chance Vought’s new engine seemed to lie within the realm of possibility. The 200-hp Whirlwind had a cylinder volume of some 800 cubic inches; the bigger Cyclone, at 450 hp, had about 1,650 cubic inches. A Wright engine just between these two might displace about 1,200 cubic inches, and conceivably be made to develop 350 horsepower. Chance had put the job up to us and we would put it up to Wright. “All right, Chance,” I said soberly enough, “you go on back to Long Island and start work; we’ll get your engine for you.” Chance Vought relaxed and grinned back at me. “Meanwhile,” he inquired, “what will I do to keep the shop open?” “Go call on Commander Kraus, over in Procurement,” I replied. “Tell him about this discussion. Maybe he can scrape up an order for enough UO’s to keep you ticking.” As soon as Chance had left the room, I telephoned Charlie Lawrance and Guy Vaughan, of Wright Aero, and asked them to take the midnight train down for a conference the next day. They were not too enthusiastic at first, fearing that a completely new engine on top of their already heavy load might break them down. But we compromised on a proposal to scale the P-2 model down to about 1,200 inches displacement, without undertaking a completely new design. This was not so crazy as it might sound, for while you couldn’t scale an engine up with any hope of success, you could scale it down if you were willing to accept a few compromises on weight. We were willing and Wright was agreeable. Thus was born the Wright R-1200, or Simoon, an engine that, though it never went into production, still had its impact on naval aviation.