On Thu, 18 Apr 2013 11:46:50 -0500, Tim Wescott
wrote:

On Thu, 18 Apr 2013 11:08:52 -0500, Jon Elson wrote:

Ed Huntress wrote:


FWIW, it looks to me like this engine violates a basic point of IC
engine design for thermal efficiency. By using a separate combustion
chamber, it multiplies the surface area relative to the volume of
combusted gas. The result is a very high ratio of lost heat to useful
heat.
Yes, I was thinking the same thing as soon as somebody brought up "how
do you cool it?" So, is the combustion chamber in the non-rotating
center? it seems like it has an intake/compression piston and a
power/exhaust piston. If there's also a separate combustion chamber,
than that's THREE places for heat loss!

Not to mention the lost compression ratio, which in my understanding is
another theoretical limit to efficiency in IC engines. The compression
(well, expansion ratio, actually) looks pretty abysmal.

Yeah, it would be interesting to know what the compression was in the
combustion chamber. It *could* be as high as a normal IC engine, but
it looks like that would be very tricky to achieve -- it probably
would require that transfer begin well before TDC of the compression
stroke, and that the nominal compression ratio of the compression
cylinder(s) be a 'way high number.


This thing looks like it combines the disadvantages of the Wankel rotary
and the various sleeve-valve engines with the disadvantages of a Ford
flathead, all in a package that's mechanically inconvenient.

g I'm glad I'm not the only one who's skeptical about it.

--
Ed Huntress