[HN Gopher] Animated Engines
___________________________________________________________________
Animated Engines
Author : marcodiego
Score : 653 points
Date : 2021-03-06 17:29 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (animatedengines.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (animatedengines.com)
| prashnts wrote:
| Quite interesting! Reminds me of http://507movements.com/
|
| Edit: It's linked in the website as a "sister site".
| ourcat wrote:
| I was about to say the exact same thing. :) 507 Movements is a
| work of art and inspirational.
| cstross wrote:
| Needs more Napier Deltic:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier_Deltic
|
| (It's a two-stroke cycle diesel but not as we know it -- three
| cylinders arranged in a triangle with a crankshaft at each
| vertex, one of them counter-rotating relative to the other two,
| and _six_ pistons, two of them opposed in each cylinder! There is
| an animation on the wikipedia page. Tracking it will make your
| head hurt. This thing was a mainstay of the British railway
| industry in the late 1950s to 1960s ...)
| vvanders wrote:
| That's pretty incredible, and here I though the Wankel was a
| fairly unique engine.
|
| Not directly related but learning about the diesel-electric
| locomotives and the transition from PWM DC to 3-phase VFD with
| the traction improvements(I seem to recall they doubled
| available traction but would have to check my sources[1]) was
| also something that caught me by surprise. All these EVs out
| there now owe a lot to the work that happened back in that
| industry.
|
| Edit: found the one of the sources I remember reading.
|
| [1] http://www.republiclocomotive.com/ac-traction-vs-dc-
| traction...
| nimbius wrote:
| Diesel engine mechanic here and I learned about these during my
| apprenticeship. "high strung" is the understatement of the
| fucking century. Deltics are garbage compared to a modern
| inline 8 or 16 cylinder locomotive diesel.
|
| cheerleaders for deltics will always measure their
| effectiveness in the guesome "miles per casualty" figure,
| completely ignoring the fact this system had astronomical
| service costs as the design compounds stress on cast parts. you
| had to have starter cartridges (explosives) to start the
| things, and it wasnt uncommon for them to give up the smoke
| just cranking them.
|
| they have horrendous emissions as well compared to inlines.
| diesel and lube oil would roll out of the exhaust in massive
| plumes (you would never get these approved in the US today.)
| Usually on startup large diesels have monitored exhaust
| temperatures but in a Deltic your eyes had to be glued to the
| meter because the stack was always a blond one away from
| runaway (catching fire.) As tolerances drifted during service
| most fleets just fed these things more lube oil and in turn,
| worse emissions and efficiency.
|
| again, complexity. Your tolerances for a deltic were insane
| compared to what you had at the time for an off-the-shelf
| diesel. repair parts too had to be custom fitted to the engine
| as it had worn and take into account things like piston bore
| cavitation damage from overprimed starter
| cartridges/overspeed/overtemp/etc...The shop down the road
| could not fabricate deltic parts so lead times were
| considerable. Whoever worked on these had a dedicated machinist
| (not just a miller) cutting parts off a dialed-in colchester
| lathe or something with a very good tolerance.
| [deleted]
| willyt wrote:
| Yes but you are comparing 1950s technology to 2020
| technology. Sounds like the mechanical design was a bit ahead
| of the capabilities of materials science and readily
| accessible metal fabrication technology at the time. I expect
| if you could add the amount of refinements and digital
| augmentation that modern diesels have, you could get the
| maintenance down to similar levels, but like the Wankel
| rotary engine no-one is willing to bear the cost of redoing
| the last 70 years of engineering optimisations that have been
| done to the standard Diesel engine configuration.
| Judgmentality wrote:
| > but like the Wankel rotary engine no-one is willing to
| bear the cost of redoing the last 70 years of engineering
| optimisations
|
| Mazda tried bringing this back with the RX-8. It was a
| failure, and while everybody loves the "spirit" of the
| wankel, outside of the infamous 787B I think people are
| always going to remember it for the theory instead of the
| application.
|
| If we're going to talk about using modern engineering
| capabilities, perhaps we should be discussing the
| quasiturbine engine? At least in theory it solves many of
| the problems of the rotary engine, although I suspect it
| will be a nightmare of complexity that never becomes
| reliable.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasiturbine
| ggm wrote:
| Absolutely amazing engine noise, you couldn't mistake it
| pulling out of Waverley station in Edinburgh. As a trainspotter
| I stood on the platform and saw all 22 over the years. I
| believe the tested engine used to be in the science museum in
| London but is now in the York museum.
|
| The baby deltic was a more prosaic workhorse, the deltics
| delivered the 100mph Edinburgh London service for decades.
| totetsu wrote:
| the noise for the curious https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_co
| ntinue=54&v=gtv0s1JQ0D4&f...
| ggm wrote:
| I swear you can hear three notes in the thrummm. I know
| it's a projection from my memory and desire, but in both
| pitch, and it's tonality it isn't like normal diesel
| locomotives.
|
| I don't think the YouTubes do it justice, a bit like rocket
| launches: you have to be there to get a chest-beating
| throb.
| quercusa wrote:
| The York RR museum is an excellent place to spend a day.
| redis_mlc wrote:
| > As a trainspotter
|
| OK, limey. :)
|
| Maybe you can explain the appeal of trainspotting to a US
| audience. Haven't heard much about that over here.
| jacquesm wrote:
| That's a pretty clever design, thank you for posting this, I
| never even heard of it before. I really like the opposing
| piston trick to get rid of the heavy head, but it does make you
| wonder how they dealt with the spot where the fuel has to be
| injected, it's hard enough to get reasonably efficient
| combustion when you're injecting into the center of the cavity.
| Did it use multiple injectors per cylinder?
| rleigh wrote:
| This part is dead simple and quite clever. It's on the
| animated diagram in dark blue, and you can also see one port
| on the cutaway engine block photo (I've been to see this in
| real life; the engineering is phenomenal). On the blue
| diagram I think it's air+fuel at one end and exhaust at the
| other.
|
| When the pistons reach their maximum opposing distance, the
| injection and exhaust ports are briefly exposed, allowing for
| entry of fuel/air and exit of exhaust in a single linear
| movement from one end of the cylinder to the other. Maybe the
| air is injected before the fuel or at a higher pressure. And
| if you time the speed of the exchange just right in time for
| the exhaust ports to be closed over before the compression
| stroke, you get complete exchange with no fuel wastage.
| Absolutely nothing like a 4-stroke engine, and not much like
| common 2-stroke designs either.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Clever, and no valves to adjust. I really like this design,
| and I'm wondering why it never caught on more, it looks as
| though it would have worked well in a boxer like engine as
| well, instead of two camshafts and one crank you'd end up
| with no camshafts and two cranks.
| Judgmentality wrote:
| > While the Deltic engine was successful in marine and
| rail use and very powerful for its size and weight, it
| was a highly strung unit, requiring careful maintenance.
| This led to a policy of unit replacement rather than
| repair in situ. Deltic engines were easily removed after
| breakdown, generally being sent back to the manufacturer
| for repair, although after initial contracts expired both
| the Royal Navy and British Railways set up their own
| workshops for overhauls.
|
| I guess nobody wanted to maintain them.
| cstross wrote:
| What you describe is the Junkers Jumo 204, and the Deltic
| design was allegedly directly inspired by it.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_Jumo_204
| jacquesm wrote:
| Wow, what a beast. The displacement to weight ratio is
| incredible, unfortunately it doesn't seem to produce a
| whole lot of power for all that weight, though since it
| is a diesel the torque is probably quite impressive (even
| though it is for aircraft, where engines typically are
| fairly low torque). Add a supercharger or a turbo
| assuming the pistons can stand it and this could very
| well still be a competitive engine. What a nice design.
| Thank you once again.
| Judgmentality wrote:
| Not to take away from how neat that design is, but my
| favorite thing about that link is learning that it was
| manufactured by a now defunct company called Junkers.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers
| jacquesm wrote:
| The English language association is a pretty negative one
| but in German it's just another name. Coincidentally, the
| house I am in right now is heated by a Junkers 'Eurostar'
| central heating unit.
|
| And in Polish 'Junkers' is pretty much synonymous with
| water heater.
| martinmunk wrote:
| My dad collects old kerosene engines, and used to have a
| simplified version of this. A 2 cylinder, 2 crankshaft, 4
| piston, 2 stroke Diesel engine.
|
| Used by German forces to power plane-spotting projectors, so
| presumably manufactured in the late 30s or 40s.
| userbinator wrote:
| The general type is known as
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposed-piston_engine
| fartcannon wrote:
| We used these animations as visual aids in my undergrad
| approximately 18 years ago, give or take a year. It's marvelous
| that they're still here.
| AlexFielder wrote:
| Surprised nobody mentioned the MYT engine:
| http://angellabsllc.com/
| Judgmentality wrote:
| This is neat. If someone wants a slightly more comedic take on
| automotive engine designs, Donut Media has some interesting
| content.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YIDOjD0oBI
|
| EDIT: Removed erroneous claim.
| berniemadoff69 wrote:
| > If someone wants a slightly more comedic take
|
| it seems sort of rare on the Internet, particularly in videos,
| for someone to NOT be doing a 'comedic' take, along with a jump
| cut every 5 seconds, background music; all kinds of stuff that
| feels like it is desperately trying to do everything it can all
| at once to make someone not hit the back button. ironically,
| hitting the back button is the first thing i do when a video
| starts with 'Wats up Guyz' or something along those lines. the
| original post is a breath of fresh air, straight to the point.
| I wish the Internet was more like this in general.
| marcodiego wrote:
| These "jump cut every 5 seconds" is the reason I've been
| watching less youtube everyday. It completely breaks
| continuity and are so frequent that a significant part of the
| video is wasted.
|
| Reading and watching an animation is better than video
| tutorials in almost every regard.
| capableweb wrote:
| > Donut Media pioneered the "suck squeeze bang blow" descriptor
| of the 4 stroke engine
|
| Someone please correct me if I'm wrong but I think I've heard
| the term "suck squeeze bang blow" way before Feb 23, 2021 and
| also before 2015 (creation of that Youtube channel) so I find
| that claim hard to believe.
| pen2l wrote:
| This text dated 1981 mentions it (page viii): https://link.sp
| ringer.com/content/pdf/bfm%3A978-1-349-06976-...
|
| edit: and googling some more, there are instances of in being
| used it 1950s. And the likely first author of the saying
| might well be the inventor of the 4 stroke engine himself,
| Nicolaus Otto, who used a similar saying to describe it:
| _Saugen, Drucken, Knall, Schlag._
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| Only source I can find for your last claim is
| https://mechanics.stackexchange.com/a/28690/33924:
|
| > Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if the great Nikolaus
| August Otto, inventor of the four-cycle engine had a
| similar saying to explain his engine: _Saugen, Drucken,
| Knall, Schlag_...
|
| So I think this is apocryphal.
| pen2l wrote:
| You might be right, I'm not sure. At least in Otto's
| patent filing (which is found in English here: https://pa
| tentimages.storage.googleapis.com/1f/3f/4c/821c6da... ) I
| don't see such an expression.
|
| I do see though that the breakdown of the Otto cycle on
| most sites including German ones
| (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottomotor) is usually made
| in a way that just sorts of lends itself to being
| transformed that way.
|
| Well, thanks for making me go through his writings, this
| was fun!
| cableclasper wrote:
| Yeah. I've seen it in an old BBC documentary: The secret life
| of machines - Internal Combustion Engine
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfr3_AwuO9Y
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Wow screw this channel for such dumb shit.
| bagels wrote:
| It predates that channel by decades.
| Judgmentality wrote:
| Sorry, it's just the first place I'd heard it. I'll edit my
| comment. I wasn't speaking on behalf of them.
|
| Weird. I've been talking to people about cars for decades and
| I'd never heard it before them. Is it just something that
| people don't say anymore?
|
| https://mechanics.stackexchange.com/questions/28682/who-
| came...
|
| I guess for whatever reason it's just not used as much, or at
| least not enough that I've heard it before.
| mhh__ wrote:
| Even top gear referred to it as such probably a decade prior
| spike021 wrote:
| Something to keep in mind: several sources of actual topics
| have contradicted Donut Media views on certain things and DM
| has been known to steal video clips without crediting where
| they got them or use Wikipedia articles as established sources.
|
| Not that all their videos have these issues, but some do and it
| gets pretty ridiculous.
| varenc wrote:
| I love this site! It reminds me on the "early" internet.
| Dedication to a niche interest without any other fluff.
| Dudideloo wrote:
| It's actually a website from the early internet :
| http://animatedengines.com/history.html
| [deleted]
| jacquesm wrote:
| Exactly my choice of words :) But you beat me to it by an hour
| or so, have an upvote.
| coolgeek wrote:
| Do not miss the sister site http://507movements.com/
| hliyan wrote:
| A long shot, but hope they could include the Wave Disk Engine
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_disk_engine). I could never
| wrap my head around the operating principle. Also, the research
| appears to be either slow going, or halted.
| ActorNightly wrote:
| >the rotation of the disk creates shockwaves
|
| The engineer in me cringed at this. While you can definitely
| use shockwaves to compress the air, dealing with the repeated
| stresses to the engine casing and other parts is a nightmare.
| tim333 wrote:
| Cool though their turbofan isn't going to work very well with the
| compressor being much larger than the turbine - the gas would
| find it easier to flow the wrong way. The Wikipedia animation has
| more promising dimensions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbofan
| mrfusion wrote:
| This has baffled me since I was two years old. The burning fuel
| should push in all directions equally. What makes it go more
| out the back than the front?
| benlivengood wrote:
| It's easier if you imagine identical fans for the compressor
| and turbine but gearing so the turbine can spin faster. Of
| course the gasses will take the easy way out the turbine. At
| some speed, air stops going out the compressor and comes in
| instead. Burning fuel keeps the gas expanding so there's
| still a lot more volume to go through the turbine. Then
| adjust blade angles and turbine diameters to get rid of the
| gearing.
| mrfusion wrote:
| That's an interesting way to look at it. I can kind of see
| that. Thanks!
| tim333 wrote:
| Or another way. If the thing was symmetrical the pressure
| would push both ways and it wouldn't move so the
| designers have to make it asymmetrical so it's easier to
| get out the exhaust. I think in practice the compressor
| blades are closer to perpendicular to the flow than the
| exhaust turbine ones.
|
| It's also important that there is a larger volume of gas
| leaving the engine than going in as it expands when the
| fuel heats it. So while the pressure is the same the
| energy is greater on the turbine side due to the greater
| volume so it has power to run the compressor as well as
| fly the plane.
| rleigh wrote:
| That's what all the compressor stages are for. There's a
| pressure differential so the combustion pushes against that
| and exits in one direction, turning the lower pressure discs
| on its way out.
| zxczxczxcf wrote:
| After remarking on how boring jet engines are, the page gets
| vague and states that the turbofan increases "fuel efficiency",
| without explaining why or how. I've seen it assumed elsewhere
| that the efficiency of turbofans is due to thermodynamic
| effects. In this case, what the author wrote is vague about the
| mechanics of it, at best.
|
| In fact, turbofans have better _propulsive_ efficiency because
| they accelerate more air to a lower speed. Fuel efficiency
| follows from that.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propulsive_efficiency#Jet_engi...
| benlivengood wrote:
| Lol at the hate that jet engines get for being too "simple" and
| "boring".
|
| I think some of the compressor/turbine blades are drawn the wrong
| angle but jet engines have always looked to me like they
| shouldn't work at all. I know that the turbine extracts more
| force from exhaust than the compressor exerts on the air (while
| spinning up) but it's all in the diameter and blade shape since
| they're attached to the same shaft, and my intuition has trouble
| wrapping around the concept.
| amelius wrote:
| How do you drive the fuel into the highly compressed chamber, in
| case of the Diesel engine?
| jcampbell1 wrote:
| Until very recently, the injector works by a push rod from the
| cam shaft, meaning it is powered the same way the valves are.
|
| In modern engines you have other options such as an electric
| piezo stack hammer to force the fuel.
| SigmundA wrote:
| You might be conflating how an injector turns on and if with
| how the fuel is pressurized. Unit injectors create the high
| pressure for injection in the injector, combining the high
| pressure pump and injector in one, fed by a low pressure
| rail. Theses are driven mechanically via cams to create
| pressure.
|
| Common high pressure rail injectors have a separate high
| pressure pump connected to engine elsewhere and the injectors
| just turn on and off fed by a high pressure common rail.
|
| The injector itself can be actuated mechanically or via
| solenoids or piezo, but there are no injectors that create
| pressure electrically that I know of (the closest I have seen
| are voicemail medium pressure gas injectors used in ETEC
| engines). That is the electric part of the injector only lets
| the fuel through, it does not force it.
| dugditches wrote:
| via a 'fuel/injector pump'. Can click through this to get an
| idea of just how complicated(and analog) they are.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKZL7Y0b5-U
| cityofdelusion wrote:
| The fuel injectors operate at very high pressures (200+
| megapascals). Interestingly, it makes working on these systems
| dangerous since the atomized fuel can inject and slice through
| human tissue.
| capableweb wrote:
| The diesel engine is found here for the record:
| http://animatedengines.com/diesel.html
|
| Short answer: you need a fuel injector that can handle
| injection into the highly-compressed air. Longer answer:
| https://www.britannica.com/technology/diesel-engine/Fuel-inj...
| jacquesm wrote:
| The 'oldfashioned' way was using a high pressure fuel pump,
| basically a needle sized piston pushing a tiny little bit of
| fuel into a high pressure metal fuel line, the springloaded
| ballbearing return valve at the tip of the injector would be
| pushed open by the fuel and then the fuel could stream past the
| ballbearing to the injector nozzle.
| mcguire wrote:
| Adding to the "if you like this" chain, the vbbsmyt YouTube
| channel has 3d animations of historic guns and other weapons.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFOZwUakpRbIH2zisiRU0Dw
| eigenvalue wrote:
| I really love the content here but it looks so pixelated on my
| high-dpi monitor. It would be awesome is someone remade something
| like this but using modern web technologies (maybe Lottie from
| Airbnb) that uses vectorized images that can scale to any size.
| mrfusion wrote:
| If we ever had a high altitude electric plane do we think
| electric motors with huge props? Or would we try to recreate the
| turbo jet? Maybe resistive heating elements instead of fuel?
| mberning wrote:
| It would most likely emulate a turbofan, replacing the core
| with an electric motor and possibly a gearbox.
| dang wrote:
| If curious, past threads:
|
| _Animated Engines_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7127953 - Jan 2014 (34
| comments)
|
| _Animated Engines_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=701186
| - July 2009 (11 comments)
| TimBurr wrote:
| If you like this, you'll probably enjoy Elmer's Engines. It's an
| old book full of steam engine plans, designed for people who are
| new to machining.
|
| I used some of them as blueprints when I took drafting in high
| school.
|
| http://www.john-tom.com/html/ElmersEngines.html
| jonplackett wrote:
| It would be cool to see some Heath Robinson contraptions animated
| like this!
| mhh__ wrote:
| One of my dreams for the next few years is that computers are
| now fast enough to have physically realistic simulations in
| games - you might not be waiting for too long to be building
| Heath Robinson machines in VR!
| jonplackett wrote:
| First thing I would build: recreation of the mousetrap board
| game.
| carapace wrote:
| No Tesla turbine? I guess it would be too boring.
|
| (I know it's bad form to explain a joke, but I'm going to anyway.
| The Tesla turbine used to be legendary (as in "urban legend")
| before the Internet. Anyway, it has only one moving part which is
| radially symmetrical and rotates about its center so there would
| be nothing to see in the animation!)
| p1mrx wrote:
| The FPLG might be a good addition, though it's interesting
| because of how boring it is:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-piston_linear_generator
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eV7f3tOUEbU
| Vektorweg wrote:
| These are pretty cool.
|
| Worth to spend some time turning these into continuous SVG.
| cableclasper wrote:
| I'd like to do this. Can you recommend a good starting place to
| learn how?
| bobsterman wrote:
| Start with drawing a single frame with SVG [1], then add
| animation with CSS [2] or Javascript.
|
| [1] https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
| US/docs/Web/SVG/Tutorial/Ba... [2]
| https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
| US/docs/Web/CSS/CSS_Animati...
| cableclasper wrote:
| Thank you!
| elwell wrote:
| When I stare at these animations I can almost hear sounds.
| marcodiego wrote:
| Possibly related effect:https://www.cambridgebrainsciences.com/
| more/articles/why-mos...
| elihu wrote:
| Probably worth mentioning LiquidPiston's new rotary engine design
| (which has been discussed on HN before):
|
| https://www.liquidpiston.com/how-it-works
|
| (It's like an inside-out Wankel engine. Instead of a triangular
| rotor in an oval housing, it's an oval rotor in a triangular
| housing. The advantage is you get a more optimally-shaped
| combustion chamber, which ought to improve fuel economy and
| emissions. Also the apex seal-equivalents are easier to lubricate
| as they're attached to the housing rather than the rotor. They've
| made a few prototypes and they're working on durability.)
| mberning wrote:
| Interesting twist on a Wankel style design. It looks like the
| apex seals are moved to the block rather than rotor. I'm also
| curious as to the benefit/drawback of having the flow of intake
| and exhaust perpendicular to the rotor.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I love websites like these. No fluff, just good quality content.
| mrfusion wrote:
| So I'm the two stroke what pushes the exhaust out? Wouldn't it
| mix with the intake?
|
| Also Is it possible to build a clean two stoke?
| TimBurr wrote:
| You're asking really good questions :)
|
| In my layman's understanding, those are related. Playing with
| the piston dimensions limits (but doesn't entirely prevent)
| fuel/exhaust mixing. Unburned fuel in the exhaust makes them
| dirty.
|
| The site says:
|
| > ... This expels the exhaust gasses out the exhaust port,
| usually located on the opposite side of the cylinder.
| Unfortunately, some of the fresh fuel mixture is usually
| expelled as well.
|
| Another factor - since the fuel enters through the crankcase,
| it needs to be mixed with oil for lubricating the moving parts.
| That oil burns when it gets to the combustion chamber. Pretty
| sure that also increases unwanted emissions.
|
| It's entirely possible modern CFD and chemistry could improve
| on those issues... I'd be curious if anyone else knows about
| recent R&D on two-strokes. They're hard to beat on power-to-
| weight.
| SigmundA wrote:
| Direct injection two-strokes like ETEC's avoid the burnt fuel
| in the exhaust by not injecting any fuel until the exhaust
| port is closed. They also typically have specific oil
| injection points reduce the amount of oil needed to be
| burned. They are generally as clean as modern 4-stroke
| engine.
| TimBurr wrote:
| Thanks for the reference! I'll have to read about those
| more.
|
| Sounds like that also eliminates any fuss with oil/fuel
| ratios, since they're introduced separately.
| jimkleiber wrote:
| It's posts like this that keep the nerd in me glued to HN.
| retsibsi wrote:
| This is excellent, thanks for sharing it.
|
| One neat feature it took me a moment to notice: you can step
| through the animations manually, if you hit the pause button and
| then either drag the slider or click the arrow buttons.
| MattSayar wrote:
| There's a lot of engines I've never heard of here, but my new
| Subaru Outback has a CVT (Continuously Variable Transmission)
| which isn't represented here which is somewhat disappointing
| h2odragon wrote:
| You might enjoy this: https://hackaday.com/2021/02/05/building-
| a-continuously-vari...
| grkvlt wrote:
| not an engine, but (in the name...) a transmission - a mechnism
| for transmitting power from the engine to the wheels. normally
| cars use a gearbox (automatic or manual) and possibly a
| driveshaft (to connect to the wheels that are at the other end
| from the engine.)
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(page generated 2021-03-07 23:02 UTC)