Two Stroke Diesels

[Diesel Dave]

Chaps,

Does anyone have knowledge of two stroke diesels?

There seemed to be many about in the 60's from Detroit and Cummins but have since fallen out of favour.

In terms of specific power output this would be an excellent way of getting twice as much bang for your weight buck!

My thought are to cut some ports into the spare motor and use a turbo to provide the necessary air charge. Both valves can be used as exhaust so retiming the cam to 1:1 would also fire the injector at each stroke too.

Dave

[Dan J]

A nice idea - I never knew why 2 stroke diesels never took off with car manufacturers. Very simplistic yet economical engine with none of the downsides of a petrol induction fuelled 2 stroke. I'm aware Ford looked into the possibilities of making one but it must've died a death at some point.

Only issue with your suggestion is that I believe air has to be forced in to the chamber at all engine speeds and very specifically to allow the engine to start i.e. it needs a supercharger/scavenger of some description. Probably not a major issue though as a small turbine could be driven easily.

It's a very ambitious project though. Do I get the feeling your current bike collection is proving too reliable and not requiring enough maintenance time?

[Nanko]

I have owned a HIRTH two stroke diesel , single cilinder 8 HP.
Nice engine , but extremely noisy !
We used it as a generator , but were forced to switch it off during
the night because of complaints from a camping site at 2 km distance !
A picture is on :

http://www.einachser-freund.de/Steckbri ... Diesel_D22

[Stuart]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGLR-HqX9PY
Here's one from Oz
And another
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoawU3cO ... re=related
How they work:
http://www.steamengine.com.au/ic/engine ... sel-2.html

[taildraggin]

As I recall they are hard to make quiet and clean. I worked a steel (cabin) trawler that had twin 12-71s and they drove us mad. You know when a Jimmy diesel goes by. I would imagine that new designs would fix those issues, though.

Smaller versions are common in boats, too. One I saw had this tidy 4-53:


There is a company trying to make one for aircraft: http://www.deltahawkengines.com/

[andrewaust]

I've done some work on Detriot's Dave, emission regulations killed them off. Always liked the sound of the Detroit Diesel

It would be interesting to place a 2cyl 2stroker in a bike, as power is greatly increased, but fuel economy and probably max rpm would be decreased.

[Darren]

I used to own a Howard Gem Rotavator that had a 2 stroke diesel - IIRC it was a Sachs engine.

Had a oil tank and fuel tank and used to smoke a fair bit.

Hand crank so quite fun to start, used little felt starting caps that you had to screw into the head.