Article

2019-03-13 Science & Technology

Superlight micro-engine that weighs just 22lbs and is the size of a BACKPACK

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Posted by Skidmark 2019-03-13 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11128 views ] Top

#1 Drones and Robots
Drones and Robots
Drones and Robots
...

Posted by Skidmark 2019-03-13 00:07|| 2019-03-13 00:07|| Front Page Top

#2 'For over a century cars have been carrying around a ton of dead weight that has costed us power and efficiency.

Heeeyy! Is he tawkin' about me?

Posted by Almost Anonymous5839 2019-03-13 01:21|| 2019-03-13 01:21|| Front Page Top

#3 Building a lightweight engine by using exotic heat resistant materials has long been possible, but the cost of the materials made the engine much more expensive that the old cast iron water cooled engines. This article doesn't say how they are solving the cooling problem ?

Posted by Snavimble Bucket1794 2019-03-13 01:50|| 2019-03-13 01:50|| Front Page Top

#4 Power = Harnessing the Thermal difference.

As Snavimble has said, it'll still need a big radiator to cool it to work.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2019-03-13 05:41|| 2019-03-13 05:41|| Front Page Top

#5 "You can't have airbags or glass, seats, or a spare tire, and the driver must weigh less than 45 lbs. Also, no headwinds"

Posted by Frank G 2019-03-13 06:59|| 2019-03-13 06:59|| Front Page Top

#6 Mazda started using heat resistant ceramic materials for their rotary engines for racing because of heat buildup in rotary engines because of all of the friction and low combustion rate.
Since the micro-engine is such a small, light design it is like an RC model airplane engine.
Light means thin walls and air cooling fins can be close enough to the source of the heat to obviate a water cooling jacket.
Aircraft reciprocating engines from Continental and Lycoming get by with oil cooling because of plenty of air cooling in flight.
These a/c engines have to run at low RPM because of prop drag and are designed for low compression for safety reasons.
Cylinder head temperature is use to lean engine for fuel efficiency up to max CHT allowed to prevent cylinder head damage.
So I am guessing the micro-engine might be able to get by with oil cooling versus water at low output.
But oil cooling would require an oil pump and that would probably require more than 20 parts.
From YouTube link I can see an air fan blowing air across the combustion chamber.

And because the single combustion chamber is split into two sides the effective combustion rate is halved, doubling the amount of time to cool.

Posted by boomerc 2019-03-13 07:00|| 2019-03-13 07:00|| Front Page Top

#7 They've been making jet turbines the size of a pickle jar and smaller for a long time. Some of them are almost beer can size. They're nominally for models and experiments, and cost quite a bit.
A Swiss pilot mounted two of them on set of folding wings, and flew in front of reporters for a half an hour. He has since flown the English Channel with his rig.

Posted by ed in texas 2019-03-13 08:05|| 2019-03-13 08:05|| Front Page Top

#8 All I can think of is a Fiat 500 with a massive Ram-Air Scoop.

Posted by Mullah Richard 2019-03-13 10:55|| 2019-03-13 10:55|| Front Page Top

#9 Sounds like a slightly smaller version of my old VW air-cooled engine. They made some rad dune buggies out of those things.

Posted by AlanC 2019-03-13 14:02|| 2019-03-13 14:02|| Front Page Top

#10 I will power a small log sawmill with one or two of these things.

Posted by Alaska Paul 2019-03-13 19:25|| 2019-03-13 19:25|| Front Page Top

#11

Posted by Skidmark 2019-03-13 20:59|| 2019-03-13 20:59|| Front Page Top

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