More to remember .........

[John Hofstetter <hofs@domain.elided>]

>>I mean, the
>>first engine invented was compression ignition, so you think that
>>builders would have already worked out how to seal a head gasket and
>>hold the thing together if the diesel was already in existence by the
>>time they tried blending gasoline with air and running it through and
>>engine.
>
>Oh?  Various experiments in engines were tried in the 1700's--few that we
>would recognize today as an engine.  N.A. Otto developed the 4 stroke
>engine principle (the Otto Cycle that is still the basic engine design
>today) in 1876, which is probably the start of gasoline engines.  2
>stroke designs by  Dugald Clerk followed in 1879.  Rudolph Diesel
>patented the compression-ignition engine (burning coal dust in compressed
>air) in 1892 with the first successful mobile (other than in ships)
>diesel engine installation in a Caterpillar tractor not coming until
>1931.  But with 65 octane gasoline the best available, I don't think head
>sealing was the major obstacle to high compression gasoline engines.  And
>remember what the lower ends were until around WWII--poured babbit
>bearings.  I don't think those would hold up with 7 or 8:1 ratios either.
> I think engines have changed a lot more since the 40's and 50's than
>most of us really realize--what do you say, Hofs?
>
>Howard Pletcher

I say, sir, that we wish you and yours the very best of holidays.
In the 50's I owned and worked on cars made in the 30's and very early 
40's, and then in the 60's moved to cars made in the 50's.  I personally 
think that there were incredible differences between the cars of the mid 
and late 50's as compared to the 36 Chevrolet that was my first car.  The 
59 Volvo 544 that Wanda and I bought new was a technological marvel 
compared to the Chevy. On the other hand the cars built in the 70's, 
seemed to me, to be not that "improved" over that Volvo. Now, as everyone 
knows, it is the electronics and improved lubricants that make our cars 
run so much smoother and last so much longer than comparable cars then, 
(That Volvo went 325K miles before we gave it up, and now we believe that 
we gave it up much too early) . The early Ford V8's were designed so that 
the engine could be easily and quickly changed, and my experience as a 
Ford owner and working for the Ford engine rebuilder was that an engine 
was basically worn out in 60K miles or less, on those flat-heads of the 
30's and 40's. 

If I appear to have argued on both sides of the issue, that is nothing 
new.  It makes me feel more certain that someone is going to agree with 
me, thereby making me feel good.

Regards,
John Hofstetter