Internal Combustion Engine

CraigJPerry•about 1 hour ago

The thing that's missing here that really drastically changes the story is all the emissions control hardware that would exist on such an engine.

This is a circa 1990s engine in the US market i think? Dual Overhead Cam didn't really become popular in the US market until then i think. 70s-80s for single overhead cam to become established.

The diagrams are beautiful and informative as always from this author.

MarkusWandel•12 minutes ago

Wonderful but it irritates me that so many descriptions of internal combustion engines refer to "explosions" of the fuel. You don't want that. It causes knocking and pinging and engine damage. You want a controlled burn that generates heat smoothly.

bob1029•about 1 hour ago

> Presence of oil is critical here as it creates conditions for hydrodynamic lubrication.

You can hear this effect in some vehicles at initial startup time for a few seconds. I know of certain Ford engines where it actually causes issues over time. The model years with auto start/stop have the worst of the cam rattle disease.

fauria•about 1 hour ago

"in real running engines the rotating crankshaft should float completely on a very thin surface of oil" - I found this to be a great insight.

arlattimore•12 minutes ago

The bearing surfaces in an engine (ex: crankshaft main bearings) have very tight tolerances, usually in the 15-25 thousandths of an inch. The engines oil pump fills those tiny gaps with pressurized oil which allow the metal surfaces to spin thousands of times per minute without damage.

This is also why if you have any issue with oil pressure (ex: oil pump failure, cracked oil line) or oil starvation (ex: driving a regular car on a race track, cornering forces slosh oil away from the oil pickup in the sump) issues, you'll damage your engine nearly immediately.

felooboolooomba•about 2 hours ago

Pro tip: Show a message if WebGL is disabled instead of a blank space.

bell-cot•about 4 hours ago

[2021] Originally 2333 points and 392 comments:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26991300

mrhottakes•about 2 hours ago

Excellent animations.

misiek08•about 1 hour ago

You meant - awful knocking combustion in the first, main animation? I never catches any real bug is those great posts, but this one, especially as first animation on the page - weird.

Toutouxc•6 minutes ago

You might be misreading the animation. It's a direct injection engine, the thing that happens during the compression stroke is fuel injection. Ignition happens a few degrees before TDC, which is realistic.

Internal Combustion Engine

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