Motorhead post
For a while now, one of my favorite motoring blogs Jalopnik has supplied maybe an interesting insight into the world of motoring. One interesting regular segment (if you can call it that) is their Engine of the Day series, which every now and then gives a mention to some of the popular and endearing engines of all time. They've recently covered the beloved Nissan VG engine (a version of which is found in my much loved 300), as well as the Honda F20c engine, heart of the notorious Honda s2000 (as well as future power plant for my bother inlaw's kit car). It was this section of my favorite motoring blog that inspired this post.
So I'm on the couch tonight, watching Britians Greatest Machines on NatGeo, then they cover something called The Napier Deltic. No Matt, NOT Dalek, DELTIC.
You can read the history of it on WIKI. But basically its the name given to an icon of British engineering (the diesel electric train) , and one of the weirdest internal combustion piston engines you will ever see. Where normal piston engines have cylinder block and head, this thing has three sets of oppositional posed piston. THREE SETS.
Ok, so to put it in perspective, this is how an normalInline 4 cylinder engine works:
And this is how a V engine works:
SO check this shit out, the Deltic engine. Image three banks of 6 cylinders, each containing 2 pistons. So thats 18 cylinders, with 36 pistons. Or instead, just imaging three v12 engines stuck on top of each other, in a triangle:
This shit is goddam nuts man ...
Oh yeah... it was turbo charged too =P
Some sexy animations
Inline 4 Engine
Click to viewVarious V engine configurations
Deltic T18
... And then of course honorable mention goes to the
w16 engine
Bugatti Veyron, one of the coolest hypercars there is, and for a while held the title of the fastest production car on earth. While its been overtaken (HA) by that SSC Aero thing (v8 TT pfffft), its still goddam sexy =)