Wow, an unprecedented third mystery. This is interesting, a very early engine of some description, OHC, with three valves. The middle one seems to have its own combustion chamber (maybe). Initially we thought a primitive diesel with the center valve being some sort of injector-substitute? Or is that an injector on the right side? I'll throw it out there, guesses, theories, anyone?
Below is a very similar, possibly related device with less compression but more plumbing. Also the addition of a flywheel to the handle.
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| thanks, Rolf! |
my thoughts:
ReplyDelete> Fuel pump below air intake
> Fuel injector under exhaust pipe
middle valve is (by now) a mystery
Going to check my internal combustion machines' bible
maybe compressed air inlet valve, for engine startup?
ReplyDeletemy guess is that those flasks are for storing compressed air, captured from inside the combustion chamber. One of these is used to start the engine using the back cock and the one way valve inside the cylinder head.
ReplyDeleteOn top of the back flask is a (destroyed) pressure manometer.
About the middle valve, and because there are two channels (one brown, one green) closed by the valve cone, I would say it's an (the crudest) injector.
understanding that an internal combustion engine is a type of pump, I don't think this is an engine, I think it's some type of pump for vacuum or very low pressure. The con rod and wrist pin are tiny and the combustion chamber is so big the comp. ratio would be extremely low. those small chambers are maybe accumulators or something to smooth the flow. Just me guessing, I'm not an engineer just kinda handy
ReplyDeleteI don't read German, maybe someone can read those markings on those chambers on the side
ReplyDelete"Druckluft" means compressed air, and that's what's written on the tanks. My guess it's a model of a primative Diesel engine with a compressed-air (possibly exhaust-gas) fuel-injection system that ran on either atomized oil or (more likely) coal dust. They were Rube-Goldberg contraptions that didn't work well and frequently blew up.
ReplyDeleteRefer to Fig. 3 here and note "L-Gas Tank with compressed gas pressure(air, combustible gas or a mixture)" etc:
https://evolventdesign.com/blogs/history/rudolph-diesel-a-patent-and-coal
Note also that the last picture is a different engine altogether.
Looks like some kind of poppet inside the combustion chamber marked "4". I see that the center valve could be an "injector" maybe but that chamber is massive and wouldn't allow enough compression to fire as a diesel. Maybe it's just a theoretical model, that would account for the wimpy con rod, huge chamber, etc.
ReplyDeleteI think that because it dates to the beginnings of internal combustion, and is a model it may not even need to be a workable device.
ReplyDelete