Ceramic Engines ?
- Thread starter lexico
- Start date
Shooter452
先輩
- 5 Jan 2005
- 182
- 6
I was aware of a prototype ceramic engine
I cannot remember but I think that if it was made by BMW or Audi or Mercedes, but I remember reading about it in the car mags and was attributed to a German company (?).
It was a wet-sleeve engine where the block was made of ceramic material with steel piston sleeves and forged steel pistons. The crankshaft ran on roller bearings, and the head was cast aluminum liked those used by Alfa-Romeo's. It was a DOHC engine that weighed little but generated something like 400 bhp and 350 ft/lbs of torque at around 5000 rpm (!!!). I do not remember if it was four of six cylander, but it was an inline engine.
I wish I could remember more, but I am not certain about all of the stuff I just gave you, lex. It was a long time ago.
I cannot remember but I think that if it was made by BMW or Audi or Mercedes, but I remember reading about it in the car mags and was attributed to a German company (?).
It was a wet-sleeve engine where the block was made of ceramic material with steel piston sleeves and forged steel pistons. The crankshaft ran on roller bearings, and the head was cast aluminum liked those used by Alfa-Romeo's. It was a DOHC engine that weighed little but generated something like 400 bhp and 350 ft/lbs of torque at around 5000 rpm (!!!). I do not remember if it was four of six cylander, but it was an inline engine.
I wish I could remember more, but I am not certain about all of the stuff I just gave you, lex. It was a long time ago.
lexico
後輩
- 22 Dec 2004
- 2,584
- 155
- Thread starter
- #3
Thank you , Shooter! I'm amazed that it was a long time ago and you still remember so much of it!
SO I gather it was developed somewhere in Germany as a commercial testing but the technology never quite took a foothold.
Well, at least now I know I'm not totally in the dark!
SO I gather it was developed somewhere in Germany as a commercial testing but the technology never quite took a foothold.
Well, at least now I know I'm not totally in the dark!
Shooter452
先輩
- 5 Jan 2005
- 182
- 6
lexico said:Thank you , Shooter! I'm amazed that it was a long time ago and you still remember so much of it!
SO I gather it was developed somewhere in Germany as a commercial testing but the technology never quite took a foothold.
Well, at least now I know I'm not totally in the dark!
Engine reliability seemed to be zero.
I think they over-engineered it, trying to make a high-performance engine where they should have just tried to make something that would power a VW Beetle.
Everyone in the car mags thought that it was something that they wanted to put into endurance racing where weight is a big problem. Of course reliability was a requirement that they could not resolve. End of story, I guess.
lexico
後輩
- 22 Dec 2004
- 2,584
- 155
- Thread starter
- #6
Thank you for the additional info. With all the car-vital figures, I would not know zilch about what they could possibly mean. So I guess even the top German engineers had trobule predicting or engineering reliability, and of course predicting market demand plus balancing investment-returns (of course financial engineers' job though ) were no easy tasks !
Thanks again for your expert opinion; only a novice can appreciate that and only because he has none !
) were no easy tasks ! Thanks again for your expert opinion; only a novice can appreciate that and only because he has none !
- 9 Feb 2005
- 718
- 48
I seem to remember, some years ago now, that GM were working on it ... the whole idea, it seems, was that the engine could run without lubricants of any kind ..... very handy for folks like me, who forget to add oil on an ongoing basis !
The bad news seems to have been that it ran at a temperature somewhere near to that of the surface of the sun ..... and .....
.... cooling was a problem ! (Not for the engine... just the car....you....your garage....road surfaces .... anything else !)
That's all I know on this one.
Regards,
ﾆ淡ﾆ停?｡ﾆ停?
The bad news seems to have been that it ran at a temperature somewhere near to that of the surface of the sun ..... and .....
.... cooling was a problem ! (Not for the engine... just the car....you....your garage....road surfaces .... anything else !)
That's all I know on this one.
Regards,
ﾆ淡ﾆ停?｡ﾆ停?
