Internal Combustion Engine Essay Introduction

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The Internal-Combustion Engine Nearly every vehicle on the road today is powered by some version of the four-stroke internal-combustion engine patented by Nikolaus Otto in 1876. Otto exploited the findings of French physicist Sadi Carnot, who in 1824 showed that the efficiency of an engine depends critically on the temperature differential between a hot "source" of energy and a cold "sink." The four-stroke engine compresses an air-fuel mixture and ignites it with a spark, thus creating a fleeting but intense source of heat. Its portable efficiency has not been matched since (Moyer). To appreciate fully the internal-combustion one must know about its origin and development, its modifications and the many improvements that have been made to it throughout its history. The internal-combustion engine (I.C.E.) is very important to human life and one of the greatest inventions in history, without it people who travel long distances for work would not be able to get to their jobs; and travel would be almost impossible in bad weather. “Combustion drives the developed world's economy. Transportation is second only to industrial use as the largest consumer of energy in the US and accounts for about 60% of our nations use of petroleum” (Manly). The four-cycle I.C.E. Developed by Nikolaus Otto was not the first attempt at an I.C.E., but it was the best by far of its time. “It was [Nikolaus] Otto's four-cycle design that transformed the internal combustion engine into a viable means of transportation for the masses” (Motoring). As its name implies it runs on a basic four-cycle system of: intake, compression, power, and exhaust that is: Fuel mixes with air in the combustion, or piston, chamber; the mixture is compressed by the piston and ignit... ... middle of paper ... ...transmission has as many as six forward gears, which contribute to longer engine life and reduced gas consumption” (Motoring). Upgrades are often used to improve an automobile or engine. An upgrade can be defined as: the betterment of something, in this case an I.C.E… An upgrade can be as simple as replacing a part with a newer better model of that same part. Headers, for example, an upgrade may be to replace the existing headers with bigger ones or headers that are made of a different material the will not clog as easily; basically they make the engine run better and last longer. Knowing where the internal combustion engine came from, how it can be modified, and how it has improved will give a better appreciation for the internal combustion engine. The internal combustion engine is something humans could not live without and yet it is constantly taken for granted.

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