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Fuel consumption, and the physical behaviours behind it, have never been of greater interest to the automotive engineering community. The enormous design, development and infrastructure investment involved with a new engine family which will be in production for many years demands significant review of the base engine fundamental architecture. Future CO2 challenges are pushing car manufacturers to consider alternative engine configurations. As a result, a wide range of diesel engine architectures are available in production, particularly in the 1.4 to 1.6 L passenger car market, including variations in cylinder size, number of valves per cylinder, and bore:stroke (B/S) ratio. In addition, the 3 cylinder engine has entered the market in growing numbers, despite its historic NVH concerns. Ricardo has performed a generic architecture study for a midsize displacement engine in order to assess the pros and cons of each engine configuration.

Most major regional automotive markets have stringent legislative targets for vehicle greenhouse gas emissions or fuel economy enforced by fiscal penalties. Large improvements in vehicle efficiency on mandated test cycles have already taken place in some markets through the widespread adoption of technologies such as downsizing or dieselization. There is now increased focus on approaches which give smaller but significant incremental efficiency benefits such as reducing parasitic losses due to engine friction. Fuel economy improvements which achieve this through the development of advanced engine lubricants are very attractive to vehicle manufacturers due to their favorable cost-benefit ratio. For an engine with components which operate predominantly in the hydrodynamic lubrication regime, the most significant lubricant parameter which can be changed to improve the tribological performance of the system is the lubricant viscosity.

Rolling element bearings are known to give reduced friction losses when compared to the hydrodynamic bearings typically used to support the crankshaft in multi-cylinder engines. This paper describes the design, manufacturing and testing of a modified 4 cylinder light duty Diesel production engine with rolling element bearings applied at the crankshaft main bearings in view of CO2 emission reduction. Selection of the most suitable type of roller bearings for this specific application was made. Technology development through multi-body dynamic simulation and component testing was done to assess the effect on rolling elements performance due to the key challenges inherent to such bearing solution: high instantaneous combustion load, lubrication with low viscosity and contaminated oil, and the cracking process to split the bearing outer raceway.

Engine efficiency and optimization are key aspects for automotive manufacturers. Lamborghini has particularly focus attention for reduction of time to market building up a synergic approach for new component's development using simulation, Know-how experiences, engine engineering expertise and experimental validation. In particular to reach the best results in the shortest time it is used, in the preliminary stage of development, a massive support of simulation analysis. In the Lamborghini approach analysis and simulation has become key aspects during concept and development of timing drives. This type of activity is used to support the development of better chain timing drives focusing on improving durability, lower friction, less noise and reduced cost in less time than conventional trial and processes. Even during the concept design phase it is useful to use a mathematical model to calculate dynamic forces and motions of a chain drive.

The pursuit of flexibility is a recurring theme in engine design and development. Engines that are able to switch between the two-stroke operating cycle and four-stroke operation promise a great leap in flexibility. Such 2S-4S engines could then continuously select the optimum operating mode - including HCCI/CAI combustion - for fuel efficiency, emissions or specific output. With recent developments in valvetrain technology, advanced boosting devices, direct fuel injection and engine control, the 2S-4S engine is an increasingly real prospect. The authors have undertaken a comprehensive feasibility study for 2S-4S gasoline engines. This study has encompassed concept and detailed design, design analysis, one-dimensional gas dynamics simulation, three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics, and vehicle simulation. The resulting 2/4SIGHT concept engine is a 1.04 l in-line three-cylinder engine producing 230 Nm and 85 kW.