ICE Breakthrough!? NEW Piston Design BREAKS Records

Speed of Air Engine Technologies has come out with a really unique piston design. But is it hype or is there merit behind modifying the piston head.

Sources & Credits:

(This includes the web app software for developing bowls)

Music:
"Cinematic Technology" From Envato

[MrJdsenior]

25% more economy is utter nonsense. If they do that, I will be shocked. And I mean do it with the similar performance.

[malcolmkermode]

As an engine builder this claimed 25% improvement seems like marketing BS as with the increased service intervals. Ceramic coated pistons save 4-5% in fuel so 25% seems completely unrealistic. I would like to see two identical engines, one with the new pistons and one with factory pistons run side by side on an engine dyno to validate these claims.

Actually I had another think about this and in particular the 80% NOX reduction. The most effective way of reducing NOX is through a lean burn. The Mazda Skyactive would be the best example of this. Perhaps the ceramic coatings on the pistons allows for the fuel pump to be dialed back or in the case of common rail the fuel delivery would be electronically altered to give a lean burn. A lean burn would improve fuel economy, reduce carbon in the oil and greatly reduce NOX emissions. Maybe the dimples play a roll in the pistons being able to survive a lean fuel environment.

[Ryarios]

This reminds of a guy I knew that bought into every gas saving gimmick out there. He installed them all on his car, filled the tank with gas and went to prove everyone wrong. Well, sure enough, after driving his car about a half of a block away from the gas station, his tank overflowed…

[petasmith]

The same was found with the jet boats in New Zealand the older boats performed better than the new boats the only difference was the old boats had lots of dents all over the bottom and the new boats were flat bottomed so now all the new boats have a dented bottom and perform just as good as the old boats similar to the golf ball dimples

[nvanarchy]

So we should all add a few ball bearings to each cylinder lol

[vlhulme]

Normally you do not want dimples or nicks/dents on the top of your piston because it creates hot spots and can cause issues with pre-detination which can destroy rod bearings among other things over time.

[bobjoatmon]

If something seems too good to be true it probably isn't.
If they'd claimed 3 or 4 or 5% I'd have believed but not 25%

[sequoyah]

There is so much energy lost int he IC engine. Just capturing a fraction of the loss would be a magnificent prize and make such a huge difference.

[estelja]

Would love to get Gale Banks' opinion on this.

[Bad_handle]

I think there is a certain point in engineering when something does it's job well enough that until there is a monumental change in the way we approach physics, the idea of an ice engine for propulsion should always be considered. this along with the new ai technology benefits to new designs can help refine what is plausible.

[Eduardo_Espinoza]

Golf ball texture always means more efficient.

[henrycarlson]

Interesting, Thank You. I hope they work, If only to keep the ev's away

[MaestroAbar]

One thing you need to consider is that those industrial haulers mostly operate in a very predictable, constant pace. This means they can fine tune every components of the drivetrain to offer the highest efficiency within the tighter operating margin, where as privately owned vehicles have to basically do everything well (go slow, fast, start & stop often, go fast at constant pace, etc.). This makes optimization for large gains on personal vehicles much more challenging (and much less likely through these gimmicks) than on industrial machinery.

[iancanty]

Isn’t that type of piston similar to those in stratified charge engines? They’ve been on the go for years so I’m surprised they’ve only just discovered this extra technique of creating vortices. I thought they already studied the way the charge swirls about. I’m just amazed that this is something new.

[TechStuff]

Dimples allow golf balls to reduce air friction to travel further and recently have been used in speaker ports for better flow, so its no surprise that they could have benefits in the combustion chamber and inlet and exhaust.

[justlost]

Is the performance based on a new piston? How does the performance change after carbon build-up?

[thomaslogan]

My question is how long do the dimples last after the engine carbons up ???

[jwholmes]

With every increment of efficiency increase in combustion engine performance, the competitiveness of pure electric performance reduces dramatically. It seems relatively inexpensive and quick to make substantial improvements to combustion efficiency, while holy grail battery tech is always 5 years away. And even then the electricity has to come from some place that requires thermal and kinetic energy inputs from combustion power units.

[ujiltromm]

"Golf ball texture means more efficient" _when doing what golf ball textures do on golf balls._ That is, when creating a turbulent boundary layer of air in a laminar airflow, avoiding the laminar air from sticking to the surface of a dimpled object, decreasing drag in the process.

This was applied to the front face of the VW Golf to great effect, again, due to the car moving in laminar air, decreasing the drag of air on the car.

We are talking about applying this principle to a piston moving forward against and compressing already turbulent air, air made turbulent to increase the access of oxygen to fuel. I have little reason to believe there is any laminar air drag on the piston to neutralize using dimples.

Most of the efficiency and emissions improvements come from the ceramic and various coatings. Less heat absorbed by the engine = more heat in the ignited gas = more pressure = more useful work = more power with the same amount of fuel or less fuel for the same power. Now we're talking.

If I am right (and I reckon there's a chance I'm not) then the dimples are a marketing plot device meant to promote a company that wouldn't receive much attention otherwise for doing the "same old pistons with a dull coat". Can't really justify $2300 for coatings alone, gotta add machining that hauler company businessmen can understand is expensive.

[ehsnils]

I see that you have the Volvo WAVE piston for diesels. I did meet one of the persons behind that design a few years ago.