27 Facts About Diesel engine

1.

Diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-called compression-ignition engine .

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2.

The torque a diesel engine produces is controlled by manipulating the air-fuel ratio ; instead of throttling the intake air, the diesel engine relies on altering the amount of fuel that is injected, and the air-fuel ratio is usually high.

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3.

Diesel engine has the highest thermal efficiency of any practical internal or external combustion engine due to its very high expansion ratio and inherent lean burn which enables heat dissipation by the excess air.

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4.

The combined cycle gas turbine is a combustion engine that is more efficient than a diesel engine, but it is, due to its mass and dimensions, unsuited for vehicles, watercraft, or aircraft.

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5.

In 1878, Rudolf Diesel engine, who was a student at the "Polytechnikum" in Munich, attended the lectures of Carl von Linde.

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6.

Diesel engine was exposed to a fire piston, a traditional fire starter using rapid adiabatic compression principles which Linde had acquired from Southeast Asia.

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7.

Diesel engine was heavily criticised for his essay, but only few found the mistake that he made; his rational heat motor was supposed to utilise a constant temperature cycle that would require a much higher level of compression than that needed for compression ignition.

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8.

Diesel engine's idea was to compress the air so tightly that the temperature of the air would exceed that of combustion.

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9.

In 1892, Diesel engine received patents in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States for "Method of and Apparatus for Converting Heat into Work".

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10.

Diesel engine was attacked and criticised over a time period of several years.

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11.

Critics claimed that Diesel never invented a new motor and that the invention of the diesel engine is fraud.

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12.

Diesel engine's claims were unfounded and he lost a patent lawsuit against Diesel.

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13.

Friedrich Sass argues that, it can be presumed that Diesel copied the concept of air-blast injection from George B Brayton, albeit that Diesel substantially improved the system.

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14.

P–V diagram is a simplified and idealised representation of the events involved in a diesel engine cycle, arranged to illustrate the similarity with a Carnot cycle.

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15.

The compression in a two-stroke diesel engine is similar to the compression that takes place in a four-stroke diesel engine: As the piston passes through bottom centre and starts upward, compression commences, culminating in fuel injection and ignition.

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16.

Usually, a two-stroke ship diesel engine has a single-stage turbocharger with a turbine that has an axial inflow and a radial outflow.

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17.

Electronic control of the fuel injection transformed the direct injection Diesel engine by allowing much greater control over the combustion.

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18.

An indirect diesel injection system engine delivers fuel into a small chamber called a swirl chamber, precombustion chamber, pre chamber or ante-chamber, which is connected to the cylinder by a narrow air passage.

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19.

Average diesel engine has a poorer power-to-mass ratio than an equivalent petrol engine.

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20.

Also, the mass of a diesel engine is typically higher, since the higher operating pressure inside the combustion chamber increases the internal forces, which requires stronger parts to withstand these forces.

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21.

Activating the decompression lever locks the outlet valves in a slight down position, resulting in the Diesel engine not having any compression and thus allowing for turning the crankshaft over with significantly less resistance.

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22.

However, Diesel just considered using coal dust ; his actual engine was designed to operate on petroleum, which was replaced with regular petrol and kerosene for further testing purposes, as petroleum proved to be too viscous.

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23.

Once the Diesel engine has warmed, returning warm fuel prevents waxing in the tank.

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24.

Diesel engine exhaust has been classified as an IARC Group 1 carcinogen.

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25.

In 1893, Rudolf Diesel suggested that the diesel engine could possibly power 'wagons' .

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26.

Usually, the Diesel engine was mated with a pneumatically operated mechanical gearbox, due to the low size, mass, and production costs of this design.

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27.

The Diesel engine's crankshaft rotational frequency is chosen so that the mains' frequency is a multiple of it.

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