One of the world’s leading race engine manufacturers has revealed their design philosophy regarding seals and gaskets to RET Monitor this month. Dave Salisbury, Chief Design Engineer at Engine Developments Ltd (EDL), told RET Monitor, “It’s a simple philosophy really… we just work hard to eliminate seals and gaskets wherever we can.” Whilst that sounds straight forward and much like common sense it is actually something which is very hard to achieve and...
Some of us have the regular chance to see an engine running hard on the dyno, and in many cases it is visually obvious that there is a lot of heat being radiated from the exhausts. There are many video clips and pictures on the internet showing exhaust systems glowing bright red, especially on very high-speed engines such as found in Formula One. Whilst it is clear that there is a great deal of heat being generated, what to do with this excess of energy is not clear. The management of this...
In previous articles we have looked at how to calculate fastener and joint stiffness, and seen how these values of stiffness can affect the proportion of the working load experienced by the fastener by calculating the ‘load coefficient’.See https://www.highpowermedia.com/articles/401/back-to-basics-part-2/ The forthcoming article in Race Engine Technology on the subject presents some simple examples of how variations in fastener stiffness can affect the levels of stress in...
Today, we are told, is the beginning of the Low Carbon Age. The Stone Age, the Bronze Age and the Iron Age have come and gone while the Fossil Fuel Age, if you believe many of the pundits, is slowly to be phased out. Ahead of us, or so it would appear, lies the future of maintenance-free electric motors and expensive failing batteries. Setting aside the practicalities of how we actually generate this low carbon electricity, I would just like to point out that even as I write there is one...
The science of engine development is one of incremental steps; small but measurable increases in power over a period of time. Improvements in port flow, increasing the engine rev limit or changes in intake or exhaust system sizes will, no doubt, help. But while that is undoubtedly the high profile, glamorous part of development, as far as engine performance goes, it is only half the story. The other, perhaps less glamorous part is that of minimising the parasitic losses; the friction in...