I want to present my project, I want to design and build a motogp or F1 engine (only a single cylinder research engine at the moment).


Target of my project :

Power output: 226HP (56.5HP @ 17000RPM) x 4 cylinder
Unitary displacement: 200cc
Maximum RPM: 18200RPM at 23.5m/s mean piston speed.
BMEP: about 13.5 Bar, more than 130% volumetric efficiency

Some stages of the project:

- Design and test valve train to rise up 18500RPM, it is better idea to test it with head not installed on engine, for example a electric motor driving camshaft.
- Design of bell mouth, throttle body, intake port, valve and valve timing to get more than 130% % of volumetric efficiency at 14500RPM, a CFD model could useful.
- Build, test, and fine tune a single cylinder research engine on dyno. Some tools to measure chamber pressure, volumetric efficiency, and intake, exhaust pressure pulses will be absolutely necessary.

http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/mi01_25_feb_07.jpg
http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/condunto-admision.jpg


I have making drawings in SolidWorks, i can share my designs if you want to help me. I have 31 years and to design hi-end racing engines is my dream.

http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/puertos.jpg

First part machining:
http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/mecanizado2.jpg

It is a expensive hobby for me and i am looking for financing for this project here in Spain, there are some serious motogp projects here in Spain, but it is dificult.

I have a f1 piston (ps01 minardi coswoth) and valve set of this engine! to use as starting point.

Any help will be welcomed

Jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/

Hey jlc,
282 horsepower per litre is an extremely ambitous goal.
200cc x 4 = 800cc
226hp / 0.8 = 282hp
91mm Peugoet F1 piston, stroke is 30.8mm, a new benchmark for oversquare.
Your piston will do it real easy, as its designed for 25 metres per second.
In your motor it will doing a lazy,
(30.8 x 2) x 17000 = 1047200
1047200 / 60 = 17453mm or, 17.5 metres per second.
You wont have to worry about pistons exploding, although you may have an issue with big end bearing loads, is my gut feeling.
Your biggest problem will be, valvetrain, you could try smashing apart some nitrogen springs to steal the seals, they are used in press tool design, i doubt F1 suppliers will share their secret stash so readily.
AND, it all has to be titanium upstairs in the motor, except cam and piston, so, you have the mother of all ambitous projects ahead of you and I hope you hang in there and see it through, i salute you!

P.s I see a gilmer belt drive on the crankshaft for driving that camshaft.
FORGET THAT IDEA! Use straight cut gears! Toothed belt will disintegrate at 13000 rpm I am guessing. Look at a Honda CBR250 motor, this should give a picture of the stress's involved.

This is a very cool project and i give you much creds to accually pull it off.
I belive too that the biggest challange will be the valvetrain. Maybe you should go fully electric or pneumatic on the valvetrain? I belive that an electromagnet could keep up but i do know that pneumatic valves do.

In the left picture you can see a ghost image of the valve.

Having already been a project manager of a electropneumatic valvetrain engine program, I can say with true certainty that it is probably well beyond the realm of doability of the DIY'er. As a maker and designer of cams and valvetrain hardware, it also isn't that easy for even some of the "pros".

Re: pheutmatic valvetrain - We had the full faith, credit and tech support of a major Detroit OEM involved in the project I worked on and even then could not get the darn thing to run reliably. True, this was in the mid 90's time frame and, since then, F1 has figured out how to do the pheumatic spring thing. Even so, it takes bushels of money to do and that funding level is probably not an option for this project.

Moreover, getting 12,000rpm DOHC drag cycle cams to live/run is not easy - we've been down that path too. Even Cosworth had their share of issues at trying to make !2k rpm engines live at Indy - we know as well as we helped make some of the prototype cams that they used back when the DFX was the engine you HAD to run at Indy - still have some hanging on our QC room wall.

The valvetrain will DEFINITELY be a/the technical bottleneck/challenge for this project. No matter the team, no matter the funding level, high rpm valvetrains are NOT easy to design and even less easy to develop and MUCH harder yet to make live!!!! The speeds and forces that will be involved here will not be inconsequential and well beyond what even well intenteded SWAG's could probably endure/survive.

This will NOT be a trivial nor inexpensive pursuit if the member is truly serious about designing and building this engine.

Hi elmerfud,

No, I am not going to use my F1 piston, it is only as reference. i am thinking about something like Ducati GP7 desmosedici:

HP Stroke Bore Displacement rpm M/Speed bmep
56.5 38.8 81 199.93 18200 23.53 13.91

Yes, I am considering to use pneumatic spring, It is not a secret, you can buy it:

http://www.delwestusa.com/manufactured/pneumatic_valves.asp

anyway, There are a lot of motoGP engines using coil springs.

i am working on cams for SuperSport engines and we have build this machine to measure cam profile:

http://www.sportdevices.com/camscanner/index.htm

Hi NC Cams,

I have not speak about electropneumatic or similar valve acting method!

You are true, it is not an amateur project!!!

I am thinking about to start with coil spring, stock supersport (R6 or GSXR600) engines get 16000 rpm with coil spring and i think it is not dificult to get 18000rpm and more.

I am planning to prepare a experiment with a alone cylinder head driven by electric motor in order to check correct valve movement without risk of valve to piston hitting.

THE TARGET OF MY PROJECT IS TO TEST AN MEASURE A PERFORMANCE (PISTON MEAN SPEED, VOLUMETRIC EFFICENCY AND BMEP) THAN EVERYBODY HAS READ IN MAGAZINES BUT FEW PEOPLE IN THE WORLD HAS HAD THE CHANCE TO DEVELOP OR TEST ON DYNO

.


Hi jlcortes ( www.sportdevices.com )

Welcome jlcortes , love all the stuff on your website , just love engine and chassis dynamometers have in total four at my workshop.

One eddy current brake dynamometer and three water brake engine dynamometer , one is a direct coupled 16000rpm@1500bhp Heenan & Froude g490EH unit.

It seems all you Spanish guys are motorcycle crazy speed racers which is fine and i have no issues with that. I love all forms of motor sports.

Your dream will only become a reality if you follower that dream " I want to design and build a motogp or F1 engine" and see no reason why you couldn't achieve your goal.

NC Cams , love all the input you put into this forum , from what i have read it seems you have been around the traps in the motor industry. But i detect a lot of negativity in some of the responses.

NC Cams are you a pessimism or optimist ( optimistic ) or realism ( realist ) ??

definitions of pessimism ( pessimistic ) and optimism ( optimistic ) -

pessimism ( pessimistic ) = The tendency to emphasize the gloomiest aspects of anything, and to expect the worst to happen.

optimist ( optimistic ) = The tendency to take a bright, hopeful view of things and expect the best possible outcome.

realism ( realist ) = The tendency to consider, accept or deal with things as they really are.

jlcortes keep up the good work , in the early to late 1960's the Sir Jack Brabham A Racing Legend From Down Under Australia www.jackbrabham.com showed the world how a little outfit had beaten the big boys at there game.
I had the privilege of seeing there workshop , which was just 10 minutes drive away from my workshops and sitting in the Jack's F1 racing car. Still the workshop had some of the castings of the engine they developed un machined.

It is a shame the Jack Brabham workshop was demolished to make way for a housing estate just a few years ago. Mahle pistons www.mahle.com had brought out ACL pistons division out just recently and they have move it to a new industrial estate. A bit of F1 historical value has been lost to developers.

Wish you all the best jlcortes in your project.

NC Cams don't take this as a personal attack of any kind it is purely my opinion and my own observation. NC Cams do you have a website i can have a look at ? if so can you PM it to me please.

cheers

ps sorry about the history lesson :) :) :)

HI

Have a look at this cnc machine , machining a alloy engine block , technology is amazing theses days

here is one film clip i found interesting. http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34250

1. V8 Engine Block Machined From Solid.
2. file is 10.57 minutes long.
3. http://youtube.com/watch?v=QsmiIeAkE-o


cheers

jlcortes take a look at the little 250 dirt bike engines of todays standard they put out quite good horsepower for there size and only rev to 13000-14000rpm.The yamaha in particular have a nice little 5 valve per cylinder arrangement that may be worth looking at.Good luck with your project and i hope you get as close as possible to the target your chasing i to have a whole lot of projects i would like to start, one being a rotary shaft to do away with all that valve gear but for the time being it will have to go on the burner as im flat out doing everybody else"s projects.

FPV_GTp: does it possible to machining a aluminium alloy engine block on mills like bridgeport with adding 4 and 5 axis, of course mill need to be accurate.

jlcortes: on what kaind machine did you machine first part

FPV_GTp: does it possible to machining a aluminium alloy engine block on mills like bridgeport with adding 4 and 5 axis, of course mill need to be accurate.

jlcortes: on what kaind machine did you machine first part


Hi toneV8 , i suppose anything is possible , would involve a lot of jig work as they have a palletting and clamping system on there 5-axis cnc milling machine.

A lot of work in converting a bridgeport , and still a lot of rotational movement of the work piece it self.

Have a look at this 18,000 rpm honda F1 engine on a dyno test cell wooooooooooo 800bhp plus , not you average family honda vehicle engine

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=014-Jxskqm4&mode=related&search=

F1 engine test http://youtube.com/watch?v=3R3F18MLw3Y

Renault F1 engine on dyno http://youtube.com/watch?v=o_QyUD6V5_I&mode=related&search=

Renault F1 Engine http://youtube.com/watch?v=y2iBbwocYZw&mode=related&search=

F1 engine exhaust fire http://youtube.com/watch?v=pp6i-ckuT8I&mode=related&search=


F1 engines now days are revving between 18000 and 22000 rpm
would love to see this on a engine dynamometer

cheers

http://www.f1technical.net/articles/4

http://www.delwestusa.com/manufactured/pneumatic_valves.asp

http://scarbsf1.com/valves.html

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2006/06/formula_one_rac.html

http://www.scarbsf1.com/

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2006/06/formula_one_rac.html

I agree to the point that all multi cylinder engines are complex in design and costly to manufacture because of the low volume of parts needed. But developing a single cylinder engine is always possible, just needs a bit technical skills and knowledge of practical engines. The most complex parts of the engine will be the crank and the valves which carry the maximum strain rather that the pistion and cylinder due to hign RPM and pressure. Hope we try to complete the engine on a trial and error basis and fine tune later than just planning about the complexity of the engine itself. Wish him all success. Nothing is impossible

hi greg b, yes, 250cc dirtbikes engines are really interesting, husqvarna has designed a radial valves engine for their 250! but my engine is very diferent to dirt bikes 250cc engines, this engines are long stroke and they are getting about 32-36hp at engine, it is really dificult to get more power.

YES vishnu, you are true!!!, it is only a single cylinder, not a complete F1 or moto GP engine. only a small part list have to be built, Same material and heat treatments than any other engine, only a diferent design.

a attach the pictures of my F1 piston:

http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/HPIM1015.jpg

jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/

Hi jlcortes

I remembered this style of valve setup a while ago , maybe this might be of interest to you no camshafts , no valves , no valve springs just Coates spherical rotary valve http://www.coatesengine.com/

A very ingénues idea by Mr Coates

guys turning there every day IC V8 engines in the 14000 to 15000 rpm rev range and produce stacks of horsepower.

volumetric efficiency over 100% cylinder fill at a higher rev range than possible with a normal valve,camshaft,spring arrangement.

here is a forum guys are talking about the coates setup on a ford V8 351 cleveland. http://www.mustangforums.com/m_1322343/mpage_3/key_/tm.htm

cheers

Reply to FPP_GTp:

I do not intend for my posts to be optimistic or pessimistic - just realistic.

When comments about "electropneumatic" and/or "pneumatic" valvetrains are mentioned, the commentor is often mentioning it as a retort to something that they "saw someplace" as opposed to something that they have any real experience with.

In my case, I"ve had program management experience with electropneumatic vavletrains and they simply will NOT package in the space outlined in the member's original posting. Moreoever, the support hardware needed to make the stuff work is not at all that portable - unless you have an F1 budget and technological access.

The impression that I got was that the member is/was intending to build an engine with a TRADITIONAL valvetrain. In these bikes, they either use a bucket follower, direct acting tappet (relatively simple and easy to design and make stuff for, providing you use the RIGHT metallurgy for the parts).

The other option that is now gaining favor in these engines is to use finger followers. These are somewhat lighter and, more importantly, offfer much faster valve action due to to motion amplification due to rocker arm "ratio" multiplicaion. This sort of multiplication is simply NOT possible with bucket followers.

Example. A known state of the art 9500 rpm road race bucket follower in a hard core DOHC race engine has a max valve lift velocity of 0.0107" per deg of cam rotation. Yet, in our "archaic pushrod" 9700 rpm NASCAR truck engines, we we're regularly opening at velocities that are at or near 0.0155" per deg of cam rotation. Makes you wonder which engine is REALLY archaic???

Now, since we design cams professionally (and then make them as well), we can speak with some level of realism and authority when it comes to talking about what it takes to make high RPM valvetrains live/work.

Example: we had a guy in here one afternoon from Australia. He was visiting one of the race spring suppliers nearby (NOTE: most of all the race springs made in the USA are made by 1 of 2 spring makers in the Detroit area). Turned out he was a former F1 mechanic for one of the major F1 engine suppliers. He's since gone back to "down under" and is building V-8 super car engines.

He pointed out how difficult it was to do V-8 engines with springs. This seemed odd in view of the ungodly RPM of F!. His reply, "F! is a cinch in comparison to a pushrod V-8 with springs. Why? We simply turn up the force on the pneumatic's with our computers to get them to run at whatever RPM we want. Trying to control a springy steel spring with a mechanical cam is HARD!!!".

Anybody who can read a cam catalog can cut and try parts which is how a lot of "racing valvetrains" are built even today. However, when you literally ENGINEER a cam and spring to do what you want/need it to do, you'd be amazed at what can be done.

In our case, we took a client from a 0.760" lift off the shelf valvetrain that had a hard time runnin 300 miles and living to one that now lifts 0.800" plus and lives for 500+ miles WITHOUT breaking things.

That sort of performance takes REALISTIC engineering as opposed to optimistic and/or pessimistic SWAGGING and/or bravado.

Having already designed and built 12000 rpm cams for pro stock motorcycles, I know what it takes to make such stuff live/work. From this, I KNOW that the forces involved to turn and live at 16 to 20K will NOT be inconsequential.

The Solidworks programs will make make a good digital designs of/for the engnie. But converting that to hard metal that will live and work requires sophisticated equipment and materials and/or heat treat processes - technologies that are not going to be readilily found on the internet. These technologies are special and well protected, hence NOT given away.

I'd contend that DIY reworded stuff will probably prove to be more of a hinderance than a help should the member truly start to build the engine.

Whereas a DIY CNC can probably and readily cut heads, blocks and cranks, you may/will find that CNC cutting cams is NOT as easy to do unless you are darn good at geometry, physics and valve and cam dynamic analysis. If you don't have a cam grinder, you can rest assured that making a cam on a CNC mill won't be easy nor very productive or successful - we've already TRIED THAT using VERY good CNC's.

Simplly put, the F=MA parts of these components is NOT something you can short cut. I've spent the last several years trying to get around these very same limitations in order to simplify and stream line my business. RESULT: you can CNC SOME of the stuff needed to make the cam but, when it comes fo the finished product, NOTHING beats a good cam grinder, especially one that is being run by someone who KNOWS what they're doing.

Having had our cams win 12 of 16 restrictor plate races recently (including 3 Daytona 500 wins), I'd like to think that we know what we're doing when it comes to making cams and doing valvetrain engineering.

Basically you say that jlcortes is incompetent and this isnt possible so he should end the project. I think ive never seen you NC Cams cheer on others projects.

And i think you shouldnt use capital latters the way you do, i get very offended by it and i think others do too. Do you UNDERSTAND?

Hi NC cams

NC cams , what is the name of your camshaft shop ? and a website link please ??

I'm making a rash educated guess here now , jlcortes i'm would think will have access to excellent machinery and machinery workshops and expertise in Spain.

jlcortes i am not under estimating you machining skills nor do i know what level there at , sorry if offended you it was not my intention.

I'm going have to say not even the F1 racing teams manufacture everything in house. I would have to say they sub-contract work to other sources also.

jlcortes , will design and utilize sub-contract expertise machinist in Spain , USA is not the only place on this planet that makes camshafts.

jlcortes has a passion for motorcycle racing ( moto GP-1 ) and there is no reason why he couldn't manufacture his own single cylinder or multi cylinder engine for the sport.

jlcortes may have a open cheque book as far as we are concerned or might have access to large amount of financial backers.

NC cams , have you heard of this style of ( Coates spherical rotary valve ) valve setup ? no camshafts , no valves , no valve springs just Coates spherical rotary valve http://www.coatesengine.com/

NC cams just curious to hear your theory on Mr Coates principle of valve setup ? http://www.coatesengine.com/ ?

cheers

Hi guys,

i think you are misunderstanding the words of NC cams. i am sure he want to help (he has sent me some long private menssages).

in his first post he said about i can not develop an electropneumatic valvetrain (someone spoke about this) with a DIY budget, it is correct. i have never spoke about do it.

not dispute about this, everybody want to help and i am grateful with everybody.

electropneumatic valvetrain (without camshaft) are diferent than pneumatic spring with traditional camshaft.

I have not experience with finger followers, but i am thinking about use this followers. i think it is the best option if i want to use pneumatic spring.


More drawings.

http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/piston.gif

http://www.sportdevices.com/arbizugp/piston+pneumaticspring.gif

Jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/

I am not implying nor do I intend to imply that ANYONE is incompent when it comes to designing an engine. Hoever, I am merely trying to point out the REALISTIC challenges and unique technologies that are associated with actually MAKING camshafts specifically and valve trains generally - no more, no less.

Sadly, I can't/won't "happy talk" folks into believing that camshsafts are easy to make - they are not. This is especially true with regard to the unique materials and metallurgies needed to make the cams work without failing or prematurely wearing. Not only are the profiles difficult to design so that they open and close things fast and without breaking the hardware. But, as one might expect, they are even more difficult to grind PROPERLY.

Each and every valve train has it's good and bad features. Each has its own "issues" that need to be considered and addressed in order to achieve the RPM and volumetric efficiencies that the member is trying to achieve.

Bucket followers are good for some situations and not as good for others. Finger followers likewise. It all depends on what you're trying to achieve and whether or not you have the parts properly suited/matched in order to achieve it. Every valvetrain has its features and liabilities that have to be addressed.

Having ALREADY met and achieved such lofty RPM goals for more than one professional race team in NASCAR, IRL and NHRA for example, I'm merely trying to provide added insight into what goes into truly designing and developing an application specific camshafts and/or valvetrain.

Have we done MotoGP cams? No. But do 13000 rpm Cosworth and Pro Stock Bike cams count/come close? I think so. Frankly, these were easy to design for as compared to the heavy, clunky, flexible, compliant pushrod systems that we're mandated to using in NASCAR and NHRA.

Whether we make the cam or someone on the continent makes it for the member, the technologies that WILL be used/involved will be the same. My point about F1 cams is this: the F1 guys use some VERY unique, agressive and difficult to make profiles.

The technologies needed to make them are NOT universally/globally available. One particular technology that is/was used was developed specifically for one F1 team. NOBODY else has it. Hence, if you want to make cams like that, your choice as to who can/will make it is VERY limited. IF the one outfit doesn't make it, it ain't gonna be made.

The rpm's projected for MotoGP are NOT going to be easily achieved, but with the right engineering, achieveable. Maintaining dynamic stability is going to be of paramount importance. When a former F1 technician says that spring controlled valve trains are a nigtmare to develop - who am I to argue???

Luckily, I do have experience in the area or spring controlled valvetrain development and will readily admit that he's right. Spring controlled, cam operated valvetrains are NOT easy to make behave - especially at high lifts, with short duration cams and ultra high RPM.

Moreover, DESIGNING a clean sheet of paper cam and valvetrain is MUCH different and harder than picking out a "Cookie cutter" profile from a catalog and having a "me too" part ground for an existing, predeveloped system. That's how we got our start (cookie cutter cams) and have come a long way since that point in our evolution process.

We do not have nor will we set up a website. Why? Because the engine builders we work with simply don't spend an appreciable amount of time web surfing -they are building engines PROFESSIONALLY. OUr business is engine BUILDER based, not web based. I visit this site to share information and to correct MISINFORMATION where/when I see it being fomented.

Our clients want custom, tailor made, can't buy it off the shelf cams and hardware. They find us via private referrals, usually from satisfied clients elsewhere in the industry. We do their parts and ship them in non-discrete packages - stealth-like actually. More importantly, we keep their profiles confidential and out of the realm of general distribution - this is what they want and pay for, no more no less.

We are located in Ann Arbor, Michigan white pages. All our work is contracted and quoted to print. We do ABSOLUTELY no "retail" product - the "name" cam grinders are well suited for "retail" product.

Mr Cortes and I have in fact exchanged e-mails about his engine project. If we can help, fine. If not, that's OK too - I'm only trying to point out that his goals are lofty when it comes to the valvetrain and camshaft.

Surely there are people in his home country or on the Continent who can/will be able to design and make cams for him besides us. Yes, the USA is not the epi-center for cam design or manufacture. However, we are at/in the hotbed of some of the most radical valvetrains that have ever been conceived for racing use. HOw so? In some instances, our valves move further than F1 engines have piston stroke!!!

However, when it comes to desiging or making cams, I feel that the products made by us or that of my noted USA competitors (IE: Comp, Crane, Crower, etc) will match or exceed the performance or quality with ANY non-F1 technology "inverse profile" cams produced by anyone else in the world. They're simply smarter than I in that they choose not to get invovled in message board jousting matches over camshafts - Frankly, I really should be doing more productive things with my time.....

The use of rotary valves has been something that has stimulated interest for decades. Despite gobs of testing and development, poppet valve sytems still remain the best compromise when it comes to controlling gas flow in the IC engine. Perhaps some day but, even in spite of efforts to the contrary, LONG TERM dynamic sealing of rotary valve engines remains a yet to be solved problem that hampers development and wide spread adaptation of the concept.

Anyone ever tried this? http://www.coatesengine.com/
http://www.horsepowerheaven.com/features_all/madman/fotos3.html

Rotary valve engines have been sort or a "holy grail" when it comes to high RPM valvetrains due to the superior dynamic capabiliities that they offer. HOWEVER, they have "issues", especially with regard to affecting long term dynamic sealing.

In a poppet valve system, the cylinder pressures tend to force the valves closed (thus to enhance sealing) when the engine is firing or under compression. THis is not the case with a rotart valve. I that design, the cobustion gasses are always trying to UNSEAT the rotating valve mechanism - affecting a dynamic seal with a rubbing seal that needs clearance to rotate is essentially counterproductive to the effort.

This is not unlike the problems (sliding sealing issues) that the Wankels run into with regard to maintaining lip seals as they continually move over the piston activated ports.

Another recently learned property that is advantageous with poppet valves is that of charge motion - this is not quite as achieveable when you simply "dump" air into the champer as a rotary valve does. By staging the valve events and "aiming" the ports and seats properly into the chamber, you can actually enhance the ability of the charge to burn and burn more efficiently. Charge motion in the form of swirl or tumble can do a lot to enhance burn efficiency and power development - it also does wonders for emissions!!!

In some instances, you can acually achieve superiour burn efficiencies with staggered valve 2V heads than you can with 4V, pent roof OHC heads, especially at low and medium RPM - it all depends what your engine performance and emissions goals/targets are.

The SAE put out a book a number of years ago that documented a number of unique engines - as I recall, there was a section devoted to rotary valve and even sleeve valve engines. The problems associated with getting these engines to live while long term sealing are not insubstantial and also well documented. In ALL cases, these engines are/were plagued with sealing problems.

With what's been learned about charge motion and combustion lately, it would not surprise me to learn/see that the benefits offered in the high RPM operation potential of a rotary valve engine would be readily offset by the superior charge motion and mixture preparation potential that has been found and offered by the lowly, poppet valve system.

In today's engine community, emissions, driveablility and fuel efficiency are MUCH more important than unlimited RPM potential. Moreover, when you are facing a size and packaging constraint as surely a MotoGP bike would, you can't simply make engines taller and "science project" in nature, especially if you want to see the thing thru to reality. Poppet valves, even with their inherent dynamics challenges, offer some hard to beat benefits when it comes to the IC engine valving that they provide.

Pheumatic springs: F1 has clearly been at the forefront of development in this area. Simply put, they have the finances and the controls systems needed to design and develop the system.

It is pretty simple actually.

The gas pressurized pneumatic cylinder replaces the spring in order to provide the axial forces needed to control/seat the valves. Once you get past the issues of sealing the gas and then keeping it replenished as the vavles open and close, they will act just like the lowly valve spring.

The neat part about the pneumatic spring is that you can actually "program" the load to change as you go higher and higher in the RPM range. Assuming you have some sore sort of computer to monitor RPM and adjust the gas pressure according to the specifice RPM requirements, it is a pretty straight forward exercise.

The F1 mechanic that I referred to in an earlier post explained things pretty simply. "If I needed more spring force to control the valves at a higher RPM, I just cranked up the gas pressure until I got what I needed....."

When you're forced to use springs to do the valve control, you don't have that simply luxury. With force comes stress and as stress incresses, so does failure potential.

Moreover, as you go higher and higher in RPM, you start running into issues of valve spring harmonics (situations where the springs self oscillate). When that happens, NOTHING you can do will make them behave outside of changing the spring ENTIRELY or the rate at which you excite the spring with the cam.

When you change the things that help harmonics (lower lifts, longer durations, less rapid opening and closing rates), you usually find that the same stuff that helps eliminate/manage self oscillation detracts from performance - you can't always get what you want.

THe point remains that the actualy engineering of the valvetrain in a MotoGP engine will involve some VERY hard work and sophisiticated engineering efforts - it will also require some expensive hardware. My sole intent in posting in this case is so that the member does not get the idea that a successful design will spring forth from solely a CAD model.

The devil will be in the details of the engineering and some hard core engineering will be needed to come up with a cam and valvetrain that has even a modicum of potential for success.

I have absolutelly no doubt that NC Cams' posts are not meant to deter people, and that they are genuinely intended to be a 'realistic' point of view.
When I read them however, I also get a slight feeling of pessimism.
The problem with text-only conversation is the lack of tone in the writers voice which would, in spoken conversation, convey a lot of information to the listener.
We've all seen discussions that get seriously out of control on the many forums on the net, simply due to missunderstandings.


On the subject of Jlcortex's project, well, many people speak of 'Dreamers' and 'Doers'.
The idea being that Dreamers are bums, they get nothing done, wasting their lives and Doers lead busy and productive lives, an unfortunate point-of-view that is prevalent in our society.
I have my own twisted version of this.
I believe in Dreamers, Doers and Dreamer-Doers.

The Dreamer is an idea's man(or woman) who uses his brain to invent and theorise, while never actually making anything(or only a little). Examples would be Leonardo Da Vinci, Einstein etc.
Most dreamers struggle in life unless recognised for their brains or lucky enough to be in a job they really enjoy, or as lecturers at colleges/universities etc.

Doer's are the people that appear to have tons of energy, most are skilled craftsmen and produce beautifull work, these people are usually employed to do the manual work for the Dreamers. I can't right now think of any famous Doers, though I am sure the list would be expansive with a little research.

The Dreamer-Doers are the people that combine the above qualities, they are blessed with both bright idea's and manual skills. Examples would include the Wright Brothers, Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Nikola Tesla etc etc.
These people are usually very successfull in life.

The famous people used as examples above are only indicative, the businesses and companies all over the world are filled with them, from the corner locksmith or engineering firm, even the local bakery or the girl in the office, right up to NASA or Bell Labs etc. Most have a mixture of all three types.

Note that not one of the above groups is better than the other, many things we take for granted every day simply would not exist if just one of the three groups above also didn't exist.

I see Jlcortex fitting nicelly into the third group, the Dreamer-Doers. He has a dream and he's doing something about it, himself. I have no doubt that he will have a finished engine as it is apparent he has the skills. Whether the engine lives up to his dream is only limited mostly by his drive, less so by money.

I, unfortunatelly, fit mostly into the first group. I'm always coming up with idea's. I have piles of scrapbooks filled with scribbles and sketches.
I do have a little bit of doer in me, but most of the time the doing bit never seems to get done because I've moved onto dreaming about something else!
It is frustrating at times.

I'm sure all the famous people mentioned above were told they were wasting their time, that the things they are now famous for couldn't be done.
If everyone in the history of human kind believed the problems they were told lay ahead of them, we would still be living in caves!
Or would we? Someone probably told the first caveman it couldn't be done!,
that fire only came from lightning strikes, that a rock would never crack grain or open a nut.

Imagine going back in time and telling an 18th century sailor that humans will travel the sea's in days instead of months, he'd tell you it couldn't be done.
"Ofcourse it can! It just hasn't been done YET"

Edit: EEP! I had Michelangelo as a dreamer, ofcourse I meant Leonardo.

jlcortes! I remember You saying something about gp7 desmosedici. Did you mean the desmodromic valve system or something else? Well it would cure the problems that NC Cams is talking about, i think...

Some historical perspective into my "reality based" replies:

I spent nearly 7 of the first 10 years of my engineering career answering tech inquiries - mostly by phone - of guys whe called a major race engine parts supplier. After 5 years of anwering essentialy the same questions, I got the urge to catalog the info so I wouldn't have to answer these "basic" questions. Even then, guys would call and ask the same questions, over and over - even though most if not all the queistions were already answered in the catalog. At what point does ANYONE get tired of answering the same questions the same way????

Eventually I moved on and gravitated toward more technical aspects of engine parts engineering. This eventually included learning how to design cams. That progressed into a need to have to gind them. Why? Because you couldn't GIVE away the engineering unless you could make them. Since there are no schools out there to teach either, dreaming necesssited studying which evolved into doing.

The realities of business set in BIG TIME, when you have to spend in the vicinity of $100K or more to take a dream into a reality. Dreaming turns into pessimism when business is slow and you get the inevitable "all you have to do is's" thrown at you by someone who's never done it before. It gets even more challeging when payrolls and/or tax payments are due.

We've gotten the "all you gotta do's" over and over over the years and more often than not by guys trying to go from hot rodding something to race to that of truly designing and building something to race professionally. There are lots of guys who talk a good story. Making valvetrains live at 5 figure RPM levels is not easily achieved by ANYBODY.

Yes, verbal inflections are lost in message boards. None the less, valvetrain engineering is a tough task, even if/when you KNOW what to do and how to do it. The prior post says volumes - believe it. To those who don't like what I say or how I say it, the information presented can be readily ignored as the reader see's fit. However, if the info helps someone NOT to do something dumb or irresponsible, I've achieved my goal(s).

Desmodromic valvetrains are NOT readily made or designed. Why? Because you not only need a cam to generate an OPENING motion but you also need a "mirrored" cam to provide resisitive force to provide the opposite and reactive CLOSING motion/control.

Since you still need to control the valve on the seat and keep it closed when motion is not occuring, something is needed to keep the valve closed. The cams could be used but, even so, a spring (torsion or compression) still provides the most effective, simple closing/seating device. Making cams do the work over the wide temp ranges of growth is asking a bit much.

Desmo's will RPM quite well when you get it all figured out. Production tolerances is/are a nightmare not the least of which is due to the duplicity of complication involved to grind the cams.

It should be noted however that a new technique called "valve lofting" has been gaining favor in a number of racing applicaitons. This is a situation whare you INTENTIONALLY toss/float the valve over the nose of the cam at the peak RPM ranges. It is NOT easily done and requires a lot of testing and development but it can and is being done. The NASCAR Nextel Cup teams regularly use the technique. THis neat trick violates any and every reason why you'd use a desmodromic valvetrain.

To those who doubt the validity of the lofting concept, tHere have been articles written about it in "Circle Track", "Stock Car Racing" and even "Racer" magazines.

Well i've never said that desmodromic system is easy nor is it simple but it cures the problem of "floating" (I'm sory if i'm wrong, english is not my native language. As "floating" i understand the situation when RPM is so high that normal coil spring is not fast enough to close the valve on time) This is an f1 engine project its basic ideas make it very complicated....

Hi NC cam

I do not intend for my posts to be optimistic or pessimistic - just realistic.

I'm taking a stab in the dark here now , NC Cam i would have to say is a senior member of this forum group , age mmmmmm about 55 to 60 years of age. Correct me if i'm wrong NC cams' please.

NC cams , in your wildest dreams as a teenager in your 15 years of age , would of you ever thought you would follower the path your career has taken you ? and do you think with all this R & D research you would of acquired all this knowledge ?

I'm not having a go at NC cams' , guys i'm merely observing his remarks and advise NC cams' gives out to people.

It is great that he is a very active member on this forum and i imagine other forums as well.

Many people in the human history have been labeled crazy in centric people , and many great inventions have been invented through out history.

There have been many people come up with ideas and not complete them , and others pickup where they have left off and complete the works. Does this make them a dreamer or a time waster.

No doubt knowledge is a power tool and may aid someone in solving problems quicker than another person who has to iinduor the hardship of experimentation and find out what makes thing tick.

Guys it is great to see all this input , but remember many different spring control ideas have been exposured out in the race world. Some succeed and some fail.

But the guys that fail i wouldn't be placing them in the dreamer basket.

cheers Guys

ps : Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do in the first place doesn't mean it's useless. - Thomas Alva Edison

Reply to Igor: Valve "floating" is NOT necessarily detrimental to engine performance IF and ONLY IF you know how to manage and control it. This is where "lofting" has come into play.

Lofting is the intentional "floating" of the valves to gain area under the lift curve. It is done to help maintain low RPM torque via the use of smaller then normal cams. The "lofting" comes into play at high RPM where the small cam starts to lose the ability to feed the engine enough air. By lofting, you gain the area that a larger cam would supply albeit with the use of a smaller, torquire cam. Lofting also reduces fiction at that point when separation actually occures between the follower and the cam.

Reply to FPV: I am in my late 50's. As far as my "dreams" were concerned, I wanted to be involve with automobiles in an engineering capacity almost as soon as I discovered them. I tinkered with cars, models and such throughout my childhood and that got into car tinkering in my teen's. The whole time I was in school, engineering school was the objective/dream. Why? Because learning engineering whould/should enable me to make/build/design faster personal cars.

After I attended my first car race, THAT became the focus. The quest for engineering knowledge was a means to the end - the end being building faster cars. Even when i became an engineer, i got involved with RC race cars. Even never having owned them, my prior chassis knowledge of 'real' cars enabled me to be devestatingly fast with relatively mundane equipment. I both outspent and out tech'd the competition - as an "old mam", I didn't have the reflexes of the kids but I sure had the power, funds and the technology.

Did I realize that I'd be where I would end up? Essentially, that was my plan from the get go. Become invovled, become good and then (hopefully) win. In spite of NUMEROUS business obstacles in a politically riddle industry, we were able to carve out our niche. Thankfully, people I met along the way gave me opportunities to apply my skills/trade. The "expertise" had to be proven and the respect earned but the knowledge, well, i got that the old fashioned way - I bought, piaid for and learned whatever I coud, when I could.

Success is a product of inspiration and perspiration. The inspiration part is easy to get. The work part depends on how badly you REALLY want it. The SUCCESS part comes ONLY when you work for and truly deserve it.

to NC Cams: Thank You, i get it now.
I've been thinking about these rotary valves sealing problem and i've came up with this. I don't know if the idea is already old but thats something like this:
http://img238.imageshack.us/img238/596/rotaryyy7.jpg

The rotor has a "cone like" shaped center part, which fits the head. there's a weak coil spring on the one end of the rotor, which pushes the rotor against the walls of the head thus creating impassable wall. I have to think about the heat generated by the friction and lubrication of course, but thats the general idea. What do you think?
P.S Sorry for those poor drawings made in Paint, but i don't have any drawing program like CAD or else, and even if i had, i wouldn't know how to use it :P

Igor: your "idea" has merit until/unless you look futher into the realities of first MAKING the part and then having it FUNCTION and then LIVE.

Re making it: the challenge would be to make the female sealing member that the conical member rides in. How to make it is an issue as grinding would surely be mandatory. How to grind a tight, ID and a conical one that MUST closely and TIGHTLY seal against the cone will be the challenge.

When/if you make it, then how do you make it live? To seal, you want FULL circumferential sealing. Yet, that sort of fit is perhaps the worst thing to first achieve and then to lubricate, ESPECIALLY since you're now asking SLIDING friction to be resisted. Sliding rubbing seal durability has been a challenge in the wankel as long as it has been made.

This is also why poppet vavles remain SO popular - they are simple/easy to make and they live/work for long periods because they do NOTh have high force relative sliding motion occurring between the valve face and seat.

IF you can get past the siezing potential of a conically shaped part you propose (which will try to self lock in the female recieving member, by the way - after all, it is not unlike a locking taper in a machine tool spindle), you then have to lubricate the sliding elements (male and female).

Moreover, you also have to generate precisely finished sealing and wearing/rubbing surfaces out of materials that will NOT deteriorate, wear or sieze when hot, corrosive 1400+ Deg F or higher combustion gasses impinge upon the surface that faces the combustion process. Figure that out and you'll have something.

Perhaps I'm sounding "pessimistic" - but sadly, SOMEONE has to bring up these nagging issues of reality that are easily overlooked when folks do daydream sketching/concepting.

I, too, have had some (no many) napkin sketch ideas over the years. However, when you are forced to do a production or operational assessment of the concept prior to making it, or having it design reviewed by peers, i've learned that some "great ideas" are often relegated to the "nice try" heap of life.

Well, with all the facts You just got me familiar with its rather realistic then pesimistic... I'll try to think of something else. Maybe you have an idea how did coates cure the problem? It would be really helpful. And i found a vertical
version of my idea... Here it is. Its the first one i believe... http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/POWER/RotaryValveIC/RotaryValveIC.htm

The rest of those are interesting but all, as written here, unsuccesfull :(

EDIT: Their site says they use "floating seals" What are those? How do they work? I cant find any info on google...

Ok, I found another interesting thing but this time on my PC. This engine actually runs, "lives" as you call it. As i remember the constructor ran it on RC plane and as he said it was a very succesfull project. It doesn't seem like complicated, especially he made it on his own. http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/5160/4stscrvbwx3.jpg

EDIT: Another one, also on my PC (im really delighted by what can i find on my hard drive!! :D ) This was i think a 125 dirtbike mod, i don't know if it ran because the site was in spanish... But it is also a good approach, unluckily very poor quality of the pics. http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/981/hoytrotvqj8.jpg

my electronic fuel injection are ready to be tested. it is originaly designed for dirtbikes and ATVs but it could works in any 4 stroke engine.

it will be ideal for my prototype engine.

i have order some custom enclosures from a rapid prototyping supplier, it is really fun, it is easy to build very complex parts in some days!

http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/ecu.jpg
http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/rp.jpg

Jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/

Whooooa, i didn't think think it's that big. What's next to complete the whole injection system? Do you have injectors already? Any other parts?

Hi

jlcortes , very nice ECU monoF1-controller , i'm under the impression it has only one injector drive ????

" The SportDevices fuel injection has been simplified and down-sized considerably compared with any other programmable fuel injection to allow for application to a small motorcycle. This ecu could be installed in the place of a conventional carburetor."

What impedance injector will this controller run ? high or low impedance injectors ???

I will take a stab in the dark here and assume one has a large variety of injectors to pick from , even of passenger vehicles.

Since motoGP1 engines are in the vicinity of 250 cc to 500 cc engine displacement , i haven't made a mathematical calculation here just quickly doing the sums in my head as i write , one would think 19lbhr upto 40lbhr maybe even higher flow injectors , depending on the fuel line pressure the system will be operating at ,would be ample fuel supply for a single cylinder engine producing between 100 bhp upto 200 bhp.

These figures are not 100% correct , so don't jump down my throat guys.

What was your target horsepower/torque @ what RPM output you are hoping to achieve out of this single cylinder motoGP1 engine design of yours ????

jlcortes , very nice ecu i must say again read the whole page on you website
http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/index.htm

So engine load maps ( fuel and ignition ) are going to be adjusted according to throttle position opening?

Just curious here jtcortes , what ignition timing do the motoGP1 engines run at wide open throttle at there maximum RPM ?

cheers

Well, with all the facts You just got me familiar with its rather realistic then pesimistic... I'll try to think of something else. Maybe you have an idea how did coates cure the problem? It would be really helpful. And i found a vertical
version of my idea... Here it is. Its the first one i believe... http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/POWER/RotaryValveIC/RotaryValveIC.htm

The rest of those are interesting but all, as written here, unsuccesfull :(

EDIT: Their site says they use "floating seals" What are those? How do they work? I cant find any info on google...

I found more about that Apin Rotary engine: http://www.isdm.co.uk/aspin/AspinEssay/essay.htm - real pics.

Some definitions for clarification:

An engine "lives" when it can run with NO maintenance for long periods. The classic problem with sliding seals that have to seal combustion gasses is wear of the seal and/or the adjoining rubbing/wear surface. Besides that, sealing literally is the next problem.

The problems are many. Chances are that thermal and mechanical distortion are unavoidable in the sealing members. Thus, the seals have to have the ability to conform to the face and sides where they will have to seal. The more sealing surfaces you have, the harder it is for the seal to function and "live" (survive).

It is not that difficult to get a concept to FUNCTION (as in the engine will RUN) for short periods. Although this may offer proof of concept, it does NOT mean that the concept remains viable. In today's environment, engine efficiency, cost, emissions and fuel consumption are of supreme importance. IF the engine won't run efficiently and run for a long time without the need for incessant rebuilding, it may be viable - as long at it runs with low emissions and good fuel efficiency.

A prior question was asked as to "how does Coates do it?". Not having seen the engine run nor seeing much if any performance curves using SAE test methods, one can ask "does it REALLY run?" or is it merely a "proof of concept" the hasn't yet or adequately shown the required or expected durability for OEM viability.

Regarding a patent, this does NOT proove that the concept is viable - it only prooves that it is unique. I know of and can point out a patent that was granted for a valve train concept that offers the worst possible condition for generating wear in the valve guides and/or on the valve stems. The only reason why nobody did it that way before (thus it was unique enough to gain patent coverage) was because the geometry was the worst way to do it.

Anymore, it is NOT that difficult to get poppet valvetrains to run and live at engine speeds of 9000+ rpm. In fact, the F! boys readily turn upwards of 18-20K with poppet valves. Valvetrain dynamics are no longer the limiting factors in high speed engines. Perhaps this is why rotary valve engine work is not seeing so much prominence with regard to development and/or visibilty.

I recall seeing that the F1 boys were having more trouble getting the fuel to burn fast and complete enough at speeds at and above 16,000 rpm. Getting poppet valves to live and run was NOT the weak link anymore. If ANYBODY wanted or needed to eliminate poppet vavles, F1 would probably be at the forefront of the demand curve. However, each and every week, the F1 teams show up with poppet valved engines.

That alone says volumes....

my electronic fuel injection are ready to be tested. it is originaly designed for dirtbikes and ATVs but it could works in any 4 stroke engine.

it will be ideal for my prototype engine.

i have order some custom enclosures from a rapid prototyping supplier, it is really fun, it is easy to build very complex parts in some days!

http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/ecu.jpg
http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/rp.jpg

Jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/ I'll take one :D

...
Anymore, it is NOT that difficult to get poppet valvetrains to run and live at engine speeds of 9000+ rpm...

IF ANY concept had the budget of HUNDRES of racing teams, THOUSANDS of car companies and more then 150 YEARS of time you can make ANY concept VIABLE. F1 is a BAD EXAMPLE because of CONSERVATIVE rules and they FORCE the way of developing in ONE direction.

Do YOU think poppet valves were FLAWLESS and could run for ages in the beginning?

I have nothing to give as far as input goes, but I would like to commend all of you that have posted for keeping the thread civil when some would have flamed away!

This has been a most interesting read. BTW NC, I always look forward to reading your posts, probably because I'm an old codger myself!:)

Mike

nice ECU jlcortes is it match for my 4 stroke scooter?

Memo to Eson RE Poppet valves:

I can't say that I had much of a vision into the viability of poppet valves over say rotary valves. Why? Mainly because i came into existance and developed an awareness of poppet valves well after they had been well and deeply invovled into their development cycle. Since the market was there and they needed engineers to support it, I took interest and cast my lot in that direction.

Besides, part of the wisdom in getting involved with a development process is to choose a technical field that A) has develoment potential and B) is not fraught with insurmountable technical challenges and C) has market potential/demand for the technology. Once could say that poppet valves are to VHS as rotary vavles are to Beta or , better yet,kinnescopes. One became the commercial success but the others essentially orphan technologies who's time has perhaps come and gone.

Poppet valves have had their share of challenges. Fortunately, the development of martensitic stainless and, perhaps more importantly, austenitic stainless steels had as much if not more to do with the development potential than anything else. Modern machining and heat treating further advanced the technology which, literally evolved from that of creating nail - one of the premier valve suppliers in the USA had its roots in the field of construction nail and rivet forging/heading.

Essentially, the poppet valve is psuedo digital in that it is open or closed - yes, you have partial flow potential but you have the benefit of sealing surfaces that are not frictionally rubbing with respect to each other which REALLY simplifies the sealing process - especaily when it comes to wear.

Any time you have parts that have to spin or slide move with regard to each other, clearance and lubrication are needed to prevent siezure. One might say that the very things needed to make a rotary valve functionally viable are EXACTLY the same things that will hamper/hurt the ability of the device to seal which is a prime function of ANY valve for an IC engine. The need for the part to "live" under such duress also needs to be a concern.

The very nature of the poppet valve acually causes it to increase its sealing potential during combustion at pressures that can spike to 1200psi or more and at temps of 1400 deg F or more. On the other hand, these same pressures/temps are trying to unseat the sealing potential of the rotary valve. Perhaps this is why the concept has not had a lot of successful development - the task is essentially a continually effort to prevent the engine from hurting its valve sealing capability instead of enhancing it.

Yes the concept has a lot of charm. Yes it has a lot of "potential". Then again, so does alchemy wherein one tries to turn lead into gold. The atomic make-up is so close it is scarey (only one electron or so different) but yet, in spite of centuries of effort, it still hasn't been done.

The budding tinkerer and/or developer should not be disheartened by the unsuccessful efforts that have occured with rotary valve engines in the past. Perhaps there is a genius out there who can figure out how to achieve the holy grail. In the mean time, I'll continue on with my studies and efforts toward creating devices that open and close poppet vavles - the market and need for continuing development in this area is still quite substantial and new developments are continuing to emerge.

Well I'm 100% sure You are right but i will still search for the solution. Next thing i found is that almost every model 2-stroke uses rotary valve. Of course its not having any contact with the combustion chamber but its still a rotary valve

Memo to Eson RE Poppet valves:

I can't say that I had much of a predictive vision into the viability of poppet valves over say rotary valves. Why? Mainly because I came to know or their existance and developed an awareness for same well after they had been well and deeply invovled into their development cycle. Since the market was there and they needed engineers to support it, I took interest in and cast my lot in that direction.

Besides, part of the wisdom in getting involved with a development process of a technology is to choose a technical field that A) has develoment potential and B) is not fraught with insurmountable technical challenges and C) has market potential/demand for the technology.

Once could say that poppet valves are to VHS as rotary valves are to Beta or , better yet,kinnescopes. One became the defacto commercial success but the others essentially orphan technologies who's time has perhaps come and gone.

Poppet valves have and surely had their share of challenges and continue to do so. Fortunately, the development of martensitic stainless and, perhaps more importantly, austenitic stainless steels had as much if not more to do with the development potential than anything else.

Modern machining and heat treating further advanced the technology which, literally evolved from that of creating nail - one of the premier valve suppliers in the USA had its roots in the field of construction nail and rivet forging/heading. The contemporary development of advanced flow techniques was clearly enhanced by SuperFlow and their racer focused flow benches. TRW's development of the titanium valves in the late 60's/early 70's had as much as anybody to do as anything with the development of ulstra high speed poppet valves as any technology that has even been devised.

Essentially, the poppet valve is psuedo digital in that it is open or closed - yes, you have partial flow potential but you have the benefit of sealing surfaces that are not frictionally rubbing with respect to each other which REALLY simplifies the sealing process - especaily when it comes to wear.

Any time you have parts that have to spin or slide move with regard to the adjoining sealing surface, clearance and lubrication are needed to prevent siezure. One might say that the very things needed to make a rotary valve functionally viable are EXACTLY the same things that will hamper/hurt the ability of the device to seal which is a prime function of ANY valve for an IC engine. The need for the part to "live" under such duress also needs to be a concern which is probably why rotary valve technology has remained so elusive.

The very nature of the poppet valve acually causes it to increase/enhance its sealing potential during combustion at pressures that can spike to 1200psi or more and at temps of 1400 deg F or more. On the other hand, these same pressures/temps are trying to unseat the sealing potential of the rotary valve.

Perhaps this is why the concept has not had a lot of successful development - the task is essentially a continual effort to prevent the engine from hurting its valve sealing capability instead of enhancing it.

Yes the concept has a lot of charm. Yes it has a lot of "potential". Then again, so does alchemy wherein one tries to turn lead into gold. The atomic make-up is so close it is scarey (only one electron or so different) but yet, in spite of centuries of effort, it still hasn't been done. Does that mean you should quit trying? Sometimes, all the effort in humanity can't make one's wishes come true. Perhaps rotary valves may ultimately be the "alchemy" of the IC engine community - then, maybe someday, not.

The budding tinkerer and/or developer should not be disheartened by the unsuccessful efforts that have occured with rotary valve engines in the past. Perhaps there is a genius out there who can figure out how to achieve the holy grail of getting conflicting needs to ultimately work to each other's benefit.

In the mean time, I'll continue on with my studies and efforts toward creating devices that open and close poppet vavles - the market and need for continuing development in this area is still quite substantial and new developments are continuing to emerge.

Re: rotary valve 2 Cycles - You have to be carefull about the symantics and what's really going on here.

2 cycles have used low pressure reed or rotary valves to seal the air that is pre-trapped/contained in the crankcase for decades. BUT, BUT the high pressure gasses that are created/generated during combustion are actually "piston ported".

That is, piston position ultimately opens and closes the intake and exhaust ports (unless of course you use poppet valves which the 2 cycle Detroit Diesels used for years on the exhaust side along with piston ported intakes). With piston porting, the pistons and rings do the combusion sealing, NOT the reed or rotary valves.

In todays IC engine community, combustion efficiency is becoming more and more critical as fuel prices soar and emission laws dictate more and more that previously sloppy combustion engines "clean up their acts". This is why compact, good burning SMALL combustion chambers have gained favor. Big chambers or ones with stagnant or hard to reach/burn areas are NOT well suited for optimum engine efficiency.

Yes, even the motorcycle community is feeling the pinch of emissions legislation. This is why 2 cycle power houses are being mothballed albiet in favor of larger displacement 4 strokes. Don't be surprised someday if emission checks become the norm for race engines as the politics of emissions and fuel economy will eventually reach into the racing community.

I can recall the fuel crunch days of the early 70's. Even NASCAR shortened their races in response to the fuel crunch. The evolution from big to small blocks was done for that reason as well as to slow down the cars. The good old days of unlimited power from high compression, leaded fuel engines, even in F1, have come to an end. Even F1 is looking at V6's with greatly limited fuel budgets to force the development of more efficient engine and power management technologies.

Remember, the prime objective of the car companies that get involved in racing (outside of Ferrari) is to sell production cars. It would seem logical that the high buck R&D that they dump into racing should be of value EVENTUALLY to the production vehicles that they REALLY are in business to make/sell.

The turbo diesels that both Pugeot and Audi are running at LeMans this weekend are both examples of what can be done with mundane technology taken to extremes. Wanna bet that both car companies have stellar production diesels that avail themselves someway/somehow of the race car engine technologies???? If not now, they eventually will.

Before the flames start on diesels, i have a tremendous amount of respect for them - especially the Audi and Pugeot race cars. They are torque MONSTERS and show clearly that this essentially unrespected "truck engine techology" (how its looked at in the USA), can and will be made suitable for sport and racing car use.

The TDI diesel engines CLEARLy show that you don't need ultra high RPM rev potential gasoline fueled IC engines to make powerful, fuel efficient and emissions capable engines. When I last looked, the TDI Audi's were running 1, 2 and 3 at LeMans and they were easily outrunning the Pugeot's that out-sprinted them during qualifying.

Overall, don't underestimate the Audi's. Detroit better hope that they never decide to go NASCAR "taxicab" racing. I"d love to see it, especially with a liberal engine formula BUT with a very closely managed and declining over time fuel budget. Make all the power you want, any way you want - the race is still 500 miles long but you only have enough fuel to run 480 then 460 then 450 and so on. Deal with it.

Wana bet the cars will still be fast AND fuel efficient and not that much slower than they are now???

Yes I know that, and i can see what's happening with sport cars. Here in poland we say "need is mother of invention" and that's true looking at the development of engines. I don't like diesels but I know that the potential of diesel engines is big. In fact there are more then 70% of cars running on diesel in poland now, its waaaay cheaper and today's diesels can greatle compete with gas cars. But there is one small problem, when comparing diesel to gas : All those diesels are TURBO diesels and these are compared to NA gas engines... This is not really fair when talking about performance not fuel efficiency...

But there is one small problem, when comparing diesel to gas : All those diesels are TURBO diesels and these are compared to NA gas engines... This is not really fair when talking about performance not fuel efficiency... You could argue that comparing a 4T to a 2T isn't fair either..or that petrol (gasoline) burns easier than diesel....



Jlcortes will you be making your own piston?

"Fairness" is a relative term when it comes to thermodynamic effiency of gas versus diesel engines.

Gas engines are spark ignited, diesels compression ignition. In gas engines, you need a highly knock (self ignition) resistant fuel so that it won't ignite prior to the introduction of the spark. Thus, the compression ratio has to be limited so that you don't exceed the knock potential of the fuel.

Diesels on the other hand, rely on high cyl pressures and the resultant increase in the air temp via compressive work to raise the air temp to that which is high enough to self ignite the fuel when it is injected into the chamber. Since the diesel doesn't have to compress a fuel air mixture, only air, the more you can compress it the more net power can be released when fuel is ingested and burned.

Since the diesels are extracting work from the exhaust gasses, they recover what is being wasted by the gasser. Moreover, since the diesel fuel has a higher BTU content per pound of fuel, it has more energy potential. As I recall, diesel fuel is a lower temp distillate of the raw oil hence it takes less energy to refine it.

Gasoline engines came along at the right time as, initially, gasoline was burned off a a waster product of the refining process. Luckily, gas engines love the stuff and since the fuel was cheap and plentiful, gas engine development thrived to take advantage of the cheap source of fuel.

Things are different now. It now behooves us to develop diesels as they are thermodynamically more efficient creators of power. It is easier to extract gobs of power from the fuel once you figure out how to burn it cleanly and with minimal emissions.

If you really want to see some interesting development in the race community, try this: run what you brung to the race - gas, diesel, big or little CID, I don't care.

However, you only get so much fuel (like enough to run 400 with todays power levels) and the race will still be for 500 miles or whatever. Want to bet the cars will still fly and ultimately get good mileage too???? One more thing, no more spoilers or "un-natural" add-on aerodynamic wings and such. Back to more efficient CARS, not wind tunnel wonders.....

wonderful thread, will have to read it two or three more times to absorb

Hey guys,

I have a quick question regarding regular street motorcycle engines that rev in the range of 14k. Do they use the pneumatic valves, or regular spring valves?

Thanks

Sebastian

Pneumatic valves are not typically used in production engines - too expensive and not good for long term, install it and forget it operation.

These are more likely limited to F1 levels of engines where the ULTIMATE in performance is needed for a relatively short operating period, followed by regular and necessary maintenance and rebuilds.

More likely than not, your 14K rpm street or production race bike is using springs in concert with titanium valves and retainers and other light weight, proven durable items.

Honda cbr250 revs to 19k with steel valves and valve springs! I had one that had done 60,000kms and it still wouldnt blow when taken to redline, the valveguides suffered and so to the head gasket, its all been done before by people much cluey-er than me, my tip, buy a blown cbr250 motor for $100. measure and weight the internal bits and from there you can build a *****in half scale F1 v10, 72' like a renault easy, or hard 90' like ferrari.
Thats my dream, anyhows.

Wow, how did I miss this thread! :)

I just wanna pop in with a comment on desmo's. The main reason why Ducati designed the bikes with desmo technique back in the days was the springs. Back then the springs were not efficient enough and the desmo engines were running with a lot higher top RPM. Today, they do it because it's a part of the brand. The day when Ducati starts to design bikes without desmodromic systems - it's not a Ducati anymore.
And yes, the Desmosedici is a desmo-engine, and how I love the sound from it! :)

Springs are as good as desmo nowadays. The latest Yamaha R6 model is redlined at 18 000, and it's a production bike...

Good luck with this project, I like craziness!
Sven

Hi Sebastian,
Here is your's / anybody's cad images, please no emails. I am over this thread.(wedge)

my electronic fuel injection are ready to be tested. it is originaly designed for dirtbikes and ATVs but it could works in any 4 stroke engine.

it will be ideal for my prototype engine.

i have order some custom enclosures from a rapid prototyping supplier, it is really fun, it is easy to build very complex parts in some days!

http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/ecu.jpg
http://www.sportdevices.com/efimania/rp.jpg

Jlcortex
http://www.sportdevices.com/jlcortex/

Hi, where you will buy the injector? how do you programme the injection? it comes with some kind of software?

This project looks really nice!, I hope you will update with your latest progress soon :)

NC CAMS: An engine "lives" when it can run with NO maintenance for long periods.

Dont tell a top fuel engine builder that!!! His engine will only just last one pass, during the pass it will only do about 750 revolutions give or take a few rev's from stat to finish on a good run and then it will be pulled apart again.....:)

It's been a good read; why not just make a two stroke engine? You would make the sort of power that you are after relatively easy compared to a four stroke.....

I can help you with a fully programmable ECU that can look after fuel injection, ignition and cooling fans that will adapt to any motor 4 or 2 stroke; it's just like a Motec but for a 10th of the cost.... Interested????

RACECOMP:

Engine "life requirements" are usually set by the 90th percentile demands of the particular operating environment.

Wherease a 4-6 second pass is accceptable before rebuild time for a fueler, the same life span anticipation for a motoGP application would surely be totally unaccceptable.

Ok, then what about a 250 mile life span? To the maker of a passenger care engine, a 250 mile life span would be a joke - they are regularly challenged to go 100K plus miles before a rebuild.

Then again, specify a 100K mile life span as "normal" to a diesel engine maker and they'll probably flinch - they are challenged to make engines with 500K plus life spans.

My "life span" comment that you quoted was taken out of context - in the context intented, I was referring to "infinite life" in terms that ANY reader would/could use to judge engine life for THEIR particular field of interest.

Why not 2 strokes? Emissions for one, fuel efficiency another. There is no doubt that a 2 stroke can/will make more power than a 4 stroke for an engine displacement for a given size. However, even in the bike market where emissions and fuel efficiency are becoming of concern, 4 strokes are replacing two strokes - mostly via rules but life is full of them that you have to adapt to or bust.

There may also be an issue of practicality. The closest I ever got to hearing a 500cid 2 stroke was when they used to put 180 deg over the top headers on big block V-8 dirt race cars. Absolutely punishing, chest tearin sound intensity which alone would disuade you from even thinking about making a 500 cid 2 stroke.

Dare I say that the challenge of crafting up a 500cid high revving 2 stroke might be an interesting effort. Although it wasn't that hard for Detroit Diesel to do with diesels as their 71 series engines were side ported, valve in head 2 strokes.

But, come to think of it, even they became challenged with meeting ever more stringent fuel economy and emissions standards that the industry is faced with meeting since Y2K.

Our engine builder/designer in this instance may not be concerned about emissions and fuel usage; it may be ultimate power that is the goal and not long life duration.
I look forward to seeing the test bed prototype engine.


Two strokes, I love’ em built and raced 500cc for years.
A few years ago I made a twin 500cc motor with fully enclosed carbon crankcases and twin rotary disks. I also made my own hydro formed pipes with multi cone rear etc.

I still have that motor (in bits now don’t ask) It run flat slide carbs with solenoid power jets at the time.

If I was to resurrect it again it would be fuel injected, I’ve learned a lot since then about ECU’s and injection, I now do the odd turbo kit for bikes just to keep my hand in…….. The carbon fibre industry takes up most of my time nowadays.

I wish jlcortes all the best with this project, keep at it mate and never stop looking and learning.

NC CAMS: An engine "lives" when it can run with NO maintenance for long periods.

Dont tell a top fuel engine builder that!!! His engine will only just last one pass, during the pass it will only do about 750 revolutions give or take a few rev's from stat to finish on a good run and then it will be pulled apart again.....:)

It's been a good read; why not just make a two stroke engine? You would make the sort of power that you are after relatively easy compared to a four stroke.....

I can help you with a fully programmable ECU that can look after fuel injection, ignition and cooling fans that will adapt to any motor 4 or 2 stroke; it's just like a Motec but for a 10th of the cost.... Interested????

hi

what ECU ? are you talking about ?????


cheers

Could be MegaSquirt... It has supposedly been updated to EFI and ignition ECU in latest rendition.

It’s Sagem MC1000 ecu with TuneBoy programmable software. These ECU’s are used on late model Triumph’s you buy the ECU key from Tuneboy (www.tuneboy.com.au) and off you go. The main sensors on the ECU are all 5 volt etc so you can use what ever sensors you like. You could also use a Kiehn ECU from Triumph or KTM Super Duke, these ECU’s are also fully programmable with TuneBoy.

Out of the two I prefer the Sagem, very simple and easy to program on the fly in real time. You can also data log O2, TPS, RPM and temperature all at the same time.
All fully programmable with TuneBoy. You can pick up all the parts that are used on the Triumph motorcycles that you need from fleabay. It will require 12 volts to run the system though….. By changing the pickup sensor on the crank you can set it for as many cylinders as you like.

The early MC2000 ECU also has a cam timing sensor and a drive wheel speed indicator to restrict full power at low speed…

I turbo Triumph’s and mapping for fuel and ignition is easy with this program, I do use a piggyback to control boost fuelling unfortunately the Sagem only samples air pressure every 12 seconds. So the piggy reads from the MAP sensor, crude but very effective!!!

A very easy and ultra tuneable bit of kit. Go to TuneBoy and download the program it’s free, you will need a cable OBDII to USB that is specific to TuneBoy, you can use it on any computer or lap top…….

TuneBoy is also a full diagnostic program as well; I would be lost without it!!!!

I could fit one of these units to virtually any motor and fuel inject it very easily.
The best of it is that if you fry or damage any of it you can just go and get another one from the wreckers or fleabay!!!

It’s a poor mans Motec but it works just as good IMHO.

This is one of our turbo bikes, runs 6psi on STD comp and pump fuel. It's a very tractable lazy mans bike, makes good boost from 2500 rpm and revs freely to 9500 rpm, but you never need to go that high in the rev range.

With almost no lag it’s the perfect combo for both road and track riding, with around 50 bhp extra and 110ftlb of torque it's a blast........ The kit is made for fast hills type riding and makes boost at low RPM so it gives a very strong linear power delivery!!! Having said that if you stupid enough to wrist it very hard it will spit you off!!!!

This is a very cool project and i give you much creds to accually pull it off.
I belive too that the biggest challange will be the valvetrain. Maybe you should go fully electric or pneumatic on the valvetrain? I belive that an electromagnet could keep up but i do know that pneumatic valves do.

In the left picture you can see a ghost image of the valve.


FWIW
A model engine builder in England has done such a thing with computer operated solonoids valves on a two cylinder motor. No valvetrain. No gears. Supposed to be very fast and smooth.

FWIW
A model engine builder in England has done such a thing with computer operated solonoids valves on a two cylinder motor. No valvetrain. No gears. Supposed to be very fast and smooth.


See lf this link works

http://rbowes1.11net.com/dbowes/

The EVIC engine is quite interesting especially in light of the fact that it runs and seems to live.

However, I don't recall seeing power output comparisons or even a power rating of the engine - admittedly, I didn't d/l each and every page. The fact that it runs over such a RPM range that pushes 10K is quite encouraging.

The amount of valve lift seems to be quite low compared to what is customary for a typical IC engine - even low performance ones. The trick, however to making lots of power at high speed is to get LOTS of air flow in short periods of time. I don't see how that is going to be possible for low lift solenoid valves.

Any time we've increased the AUC (area under the lift curve) while maintaining short/relatively short valve durations, we've increased low speed torque and NOT detracted from upper/high RPM power. The only way to do this (without going to massive ports which make the engines lazy responding and very peaky) is to increase lift. By getting the valve out of the way, you REALLY decrease pumping losses, especially when the piston is asking for air at the highest period of demand (while the piston is at peak velocity).

To some extent, the things you do to reduce "pumping losses" at low piston velocities can actually make the engine much more sensitive and/or intolerant of Air/Fuel ratios and/or spark timing. Thus, although you theoretically gain efficiency due to reduced pumping losses, you lose what you gain (and often more) by losing the ability to run more spark advance.

In small bore engines where flame propogation are not so problematic this may not be an issue nor a concern. However, as you gain speed and have a bigger bore with a more turbulent chamber to burn across, you need to advance the spark to affect complete and proper burning. Long spark durations simply aren't enough.

The natural EGR that occurs from valve overlap seems to help this in two ways. 1. it enables you to run more spark without knock which enhances burning in the cyl while you can avail yourself of the expaning/burning gasse. 2. It does contribute some residual heat and or turbulence which can help to mix/vaporize fuel, especially if fuel has been "dumped" into the port as raw fuel that is not properly "prepared" (atomized).

There are some complicated things that are going on in the port that need to interact properly with the piston that is NOT moving at a constant velocity. There DEFINITELY is a relationship that a lot of poppet valve tinkerers do NOT consider when they instantaneously open and close valves - especially when the piston is at TDC and BDC. Some of these relationships are simply ignored for high speed engine use. However, to get an engine to run WELL over a wide range often prooves to be the undoing of many a designer/tuner.

I've worked on both high speed race and low speed production engine valve systems. Each has its own challenges. In some respects, high speed stuff is pretty easy - getting and engine to run smooth and well from 5-600 rpm idles (critical for idle qualtity and emissions and fuel efficiency anymore) to 7000rpm would be more impressive to a production engine designer than from 2K to 9K.

Anymore, we can take "antiquated" pushrod, heavy valved production engines and turn them 9000+ all day long anymore. With EFI and electronic engine controls, some guys can run them from 500 to 7000 rpm and pass emissions too.

The EVIC does, however prove viability of concept - something that some OEM guys I know couldn't do with way more budget money than the EVIC designer did. For that, he's to be commended.

My only challenge to him would be to make and record the power output of his EVIC to a comparabley sized conventional engine. And then compare its operating characteristics at comparable RPM's. Simply running the engine at 10K says a LOT. Getting it to make POWER, will shout VOLUMES.

This is really a great thread. Thanks to all who contributed. Wish I had seen it earlier.

Hello jlcortes,
its been a while since i last visited, hows it going?
did you machine all those parts for the motor?
is it close to running?
i did not build that V10, i was dreaming i think.
here is a cad 2d of a ferrari V8 for you to enjoy?
keep going with the motor mate, i hope you get there.
if it went into the 'tohardbasket' be sure to show us how for along it came.
Could mario forghieri, keith duckworth, mario illien, paolo martinelli please post some cad anytime?