3 ms·

It is basically a split cycle engine and the "New" is a bit overblown by more than 100 years. Even similar non-spark based hot ignition was used back then: htt

by trhway 6y ago

It is basically a split cycle engine and the "New" is a bit overblown by more than 100 years. Even similar non-spark based hot ignition was used back then: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_cycle_engine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_cycle_engine "The Backus Water Motor Company of Newark, New Jersey was producing an early example of a split cycle engine as far back as 1891. The engine, of "a modified A form, with the crank-shaft at the top", was water-cooled and consisted of one working cylinder and one compressing cylinder of equal size and utilized a hot-tube ignitor system."

avhon1 6y ago
The Backus engine shares the pre-compressor piston with this design, but this engine also has the pre-pre-compressor piston (with different geometry) and also the low-pressure power piston. It seems to still be novel, despite sharing characteristics with previous designs.
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
"Fuel injection has been tried for 50yr, there's no way it will be commercially successful now" -some guy in 1980. History is littered with inventions that didn't gain widespread use initially then some little advancement(s) came along that make the inventions workable when revisited and tweaked. Repeating firearms and electric lightbulbs are two good examples. I don't pretend to know which bucket this "new" engine advancement will fit into but I think your judgement is premature.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  Bosch fuel injection was commercialized in 1967.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    You're not wrong but to imply that Boch fuel injection was successful would be to wear some really rose colored glasses. Boch fuel injection was such a small improvement over contemporary cabruerators and such a downgrade in terms of maintenance and cost of ownership that it was more or less universally reviled by everyone who was not into technology for technology's sake. It never really achieved widespread use. If you wanted a glass half full perspective you could say it gave 1st generation throttle body based injector systems a low bar to exceed. Bosch mechanical fuel injection is almost a perfect example of an implementation of a technology not ready for mass market adoption that later became ready for mass market with the advent of new technology (cheap digital electronics in this case).
    - jacquesm 6y ago
      Volvo, Citroen and many others besides extensively adopted the Bosch fuel injection system and those cars performed better and were more fuel efficient than their equivalents without. Quite a few of them still run today, the big difference in price is what held back faster adoption more than anything else. I've worked on those systems, they were clearly a game changer, incremental improvements got us to where we are today. Almost no single technology hits the ground running, especially not in inherently conservative domains such as automotive. Interesting implementation details made the Citroen one much harder to work on. Electronics aren't perfect either, they make it a lot harder to keep such older vehicles functioning whereas the purely mechanical ones from an earlier era will quite likely last practically for ever. Note that Diesel has had mechanical fuel injection for much, much longer and that it wasn't exactly new technology to begin with. It's just that the conditions in a gasoline engine are a bit different which needed a re-thinking of the concept. The jetronic is now 50 years old: https://www.bosch.com/stories/50-years-of-bosch-gasoline-injection-jetronic/ https://www.bosch.com/stories/50-years-of-bosch-gasoline-inj... To suggest that fuel injection had to wait until the 80's before it was commercialized is a ridiculous attempt to rewrite history.

by trhway 6y ago

avhon1 6y ago

The Backus engine shares the pre-compressor piston with this design, but this engine also has the pre-pre-compressor piston (with different geometry) and also the low-pressure power piston. It seems to still be novel, despite sharing characteristics with previous designs.

throwaway0a5e 6y ago

"Fuel injection has been tried for 50yr, there's no way it will be commercially successful now" -some guy in 1980. History is littered with inventions that didn't gain widespread use initially then some little advancement(s) came along that make the inventions workable when revisited and tweaked. Repeating firearms and electric lightbulbs are two good examples. I don't pretend to know which bucket this "new" engine advancement will fit into but I think your judgement is premature.

jacquesm 6y ago
Bosch fuel injection was commercialized in 1967.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  You're not wrong but to imply that Boch fuel injection was successful would be to wear some really rose colored glasses. Boch fuel injection was such a small improvement over contemporary cabruerators and such a downgrade in terms of maintenance and cost of ownership that it was more or less universally reviled by everyone who was not into technology for technology's sake. It never really achieved widespread use. If you wanted a glass half full perspective you could say it gave 1st generation throttle body based injector systems a low bar to exceed. Bosch mechanical fuel injection is almost a perfect example of an implementation of a technology not ready for mass market adoption that later became ready for mass market with the advent of new technology (cheap digital electronics in this case).
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    Volvo, Citroen and many others besides extensively adopted the Bosch fuel injection system and those cars performed better and were more fuel efficient than their equivalents without. Quite a few of them still run today, the big difference in price is what held back faster adoption more than anything else. I've worked on those systems, they were clearly a game changer, incremental improvements got us to where we are today. Almost no single technology hits the ground running, especially not in inherently conservative domains such as automotive. Interesting implementation details made the Citroen one much harder to work on. Electronics aren't perfect either, they make it a lot harder to keep such older vehicles functioning whereas the purely mechanical ones from an earlier era will quite likely last practically for ever. Note that Diesel has had mechanical fuel injection for much, much longer and that it wasn't exactly new technology to begin with. It's just that the conditions in a gasoline engine are a bit different which needed a re-thinking of the concept. The jetronic is now 50 years old: https://www.bosch.com/stories/50-years-of-bosch-gasoline-injection-jetronic/ https://www.bosch.com/stories/50-years-of-bosch-gasoline-inj... To suggest that fuel injection had to wait until the 80's before it was commercialized is a ridiculous attempt to rewrite history.