Side valve flathead diesel - theoretically possible ? 1

[PackardV8]

Given a first-half-of-last-century-side-valve-flathead configuration. Add turbocharging and direct injection. Would it be theoretically possible to achieve sufficient compression while still maintaining enough transfer area for the air to enter and exit the cylinder?

Of course, the additional combustion chamber surface area and inefficient air flow would limit power, but has any thing like this ever been done? Any practical reason it couldn't be done?

jack vines

 

[Tmoose]

Suppose Smokey Yunick is in this early Huson team picture picture?

http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads//2012/03/Marshallteague_01_1000.jpg

 

[tbuelna]

The last and greatest of automotive flatheads is the Packard nine-main bearing straight eight from 1954

Nice! The side-valve flat-head recip auto engine has seen its day, and I doubt it will ever be resurrected for new applications. However, I love the fact that there are a few hardy souls such as yourself having a good time pushing these old flat-head engines far beyond what their designers could have imagined.

 

[Tmoose]

"The last and greatest of automotive flatheads is the Packard nine-main bearing straight eight from 1954. Obviously, that bottom end can withstand more pressure than the intake flow can generate, so could it become a turbocharged diesel?

jack vines"

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The Packard inclined valves are pretty interesting. Look like a possible advantage.
Page 8 here (but for 5 main bearing engine )-

http://www.packardinfo.com/xoops/html/downloads/partslist4147/1941-47 Parts Book_Engine.pdf

I'd like to see one of those con rods. Real broad shouldered taper toward the big end, like a FORD FE Lemans or Norton short stroke.

https://www.428cobrajet.org/sites/default/files/images/rods-1.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b73/Les3066/NortonCommandoShortStrokeSteelConro.jpg

One of the production flathead/side valve engine's appeals was simplified machining, with the bulk of the machining done making a bunch of parallel holes in the block.

I'm not sure if the pretty highly developed Harley XR and XRTT side valve race engine stuck with vertical (to the gasket surfaces) valves.
Edit - As Packard pointed out, I should have said KR , not XR

 

[PackardV8]

I'm not sure if the pretty highly developed Harley XR and XRTT side valve race engine stuck with vertical (to the gasket surfaces) valves.

Assuming you mean the sainted KR racers; the most highly developed and most efficient flatheads ever. Because the KR cam lobes are parallel to the crank axis the valves had to be parallel to the bores. The auto flathead inlines had lobes perpendicular to the bores, so it is easier to incline the valve head a few degrees toward the bore.

jack vines

 

[Panther140]

Yeah its possible.. Hard with the most common idea of a side valve engine, but possible.

2 strokes, in essence, are side valve engines.

Even in a poppet-valve flathead, you could seal the combustion chamber from the intake/exhaust chambers and then un-shield them as the piston moves. The piston and head would form a prechamber, and this charge would compress and ignite the rest of the fuel/air charge as it moves.

The benefits to doing that are unimaginable, as in, I have no idea why you would do it exactly like that lol.

"Formal education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." ~ Joseph Stalin

 

[PackardV8]

Even in a poppet-valve flathead, you could seal the combustion chamber from the intake/exhaust chambers and then un-shield them as the piston moves. The piston and head would form a prechamber, and this charge would compress and ignite the rest of the fuel/air charge as it moves.

Interesting you suggest what had crossed my mind early in the virtual design, but I couldn't see any way to seal off the valve and transfer area before it bled off too much volume during compression. If turbocharged, it's possible there could be sufficient density in the piston chamber. However, as compression ignition occurs, what happens as the piston descends and the valve and transfer area is opened? The expansion goes there and less is available to push the piston down?

jack vines

 

[gruntguru]

"but I couldn't see any way to seal off the valve and transfer area"

A sleeve valve?

je suis charlie

 

[Panther140]

^ Exactly. Sleeve valve like a 2 stroke.

Detroit diesel basically built what we're discussing.. And it is one of the most beloved engines that there has been

"Formal education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." ~ Joseph Stalin

 

[tbuelna]

The DDC two-stroke engines were uniflow designs that used piston controlled intake ports in the lower cylinder wall and cam/spring regulated poppet exhaust valves in the cylinder head. The combustion chamber was a dish in the piston crown. And the fuel injector was centrally located between the 4 exhaust valves in the cylinder head.

The only part of those Detroit Diesel 2 stroke engines that I recall anyone having a "love" for were the Roots scavenge blowers that drag racers adopted to supercharge their race engines.

 

[BigClive]

DDC engines certainly sound good.

 

[PackardV8]

There are myriad DD fans still out there. One quote which sums up their attitude: "When our sun is cold and dead, as is the Earth revolving around it, the only thing still living is that Detroit Diesel at its core driving the turntable."

jack vines

 

[Panther140]

^ and its letting off a beautiful symphony of combustions while doing it.

"Formal education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." ~ Joseph Stalin