Engine designers can reduce diesel clatter through: indirect injection; pilot or pre-injection; injection timing; injection rate; compression ratio; turbo boost; and exhaust gas recirculation (EGR). Stirling engine Stroke SVO—straight vegetable oil—alternative fuel for diesel engines. Once warmed, the operator moved two levers to switch the engine to diesel operation, and work could begin. Aircraft diesel engine Bore Carbureted compression ignition model engine Control theory Diesel locomotive Diesel automobile racing Diesel-electric transmission Diesel cycle Diesel generator Dieselisation Forced induction Gasoline direct injection Glow plug (model engine) Hesselman engine Hulsebos-Hesselman axial oil engines History of the internal combustion engine Hot bulb engine Hybrid power source Indirect injection Junkers Jumo 205—The more successful of the first series of production diesel aircraft engines. In the past, Caterpillar and John Deere used a small petrol pony engine in their tractors to start the primary diesel engine. CN (Cetane number) can be raised by distilling higher quality crude oil, by catalyzing a higher quality product or by using a cetane improving additive.
Either an electrical starter or an air-start system is used to start the engine turning. Up to four such combinations might be used to achieve enough power in a train. Some smaller military diesels can be started with an explosive cartridge, called a Coffman starter, which provides the extra power required to get the machine turning. The first diesel locomotives appeared in the early 20th century, and diesel multiple units soon after. The pony engine heated the diesel to aid in ignition and used a small clutch and transmission to spin up the diesel engine. WVO—waste vegetable oil—filtered, alternative fuel for diesel engines.
The distinctive noise of a diesel engine is variably called diesel clatter, diesel nailing, or diesel knock. Turbocharger Wärtsilä-Sulzer RTA96-C—world’s most powerful, most efficient and largest Diesel engine. Napier Deltic—a high-speed, lightweight diesel engine used in fast naval craft and some diesel locomotives. Even more unusual was an International Harvester design in which the diesel engine had its own carburetor and ignition system, and started on petrol. These engines had very complex cylinder heads, with their own petrol combustion chambers, and were vulnerable to expensive damage if special care was not taken (especially in letting the engine cool before turning it off).
Diesel engines have eclipsed steam engines as the prime mover on all non-electrified railroads in the industrialized world. Diesel fuels with a higher octane rating modify the combustion process and reduce diesel clatter. On large engines, pre-lubrication and slow turning of an engine, as well as heating, are required to minimise the amount of engine damage during initial start-up and running. Most modern diesel locomotives are actually diesel-electric locomotives: the diesel engine is used to power an electric generator that in turn powers electric traction motors with no mechanical connection between diesel engine and traction. Common rail diesel injection systems permit multiple injection events as an aid to noise reduction. Otto engine Partially premixed combustion Perkins Engines Petrol engine, petrol Relative cost of electricity generated by different sources Six-stroke engine—40% improved efficiency over 4-stroke by using wasted heat to generate steam. Diesel clatter is caused largely by the diesel combustion process; the sudden ignition of the diesel fuel when injected into the combustion chamber causes a pressure wave. After 2000, environmental requirements has caused higher development cost for engines, and it has become common for passenger multiple units to use engines and automatic mechanical gearboxes made for trucks. While electric locomotives have replaced the diesel locomotive for some passenger traffic in Europe and Asia, diesel is still today very popular for cargo-hauling freight trains and on tracks where electrification is not feasible.
See all parts for diesel engine, for sale on our webpage.