Wednesday, 26 November 2014

The Boxer Engine

If you are reading this post you must probably be confused about the title. If you are aware of the vehicles and IC engines you are most probably familiar with two types of engines,In-line engine and V engine. Both of these engines are widely used in many vehicles all over the world.



The above picture shows the typical arrangement of cylinders in an inline engine. All the pistons are in a straight line and the crank shaft is supplied with torque once the engine starts working. Since all the pistons move in the vertical manner the vibration will be minimized, but the stability of the engine is very low since the center of gravity will be very much reduced by the smaller base area of the engine.

But this engine is broadly used because of the simplicity in construction and the less space occupation of the engine. In order to minimize the cost and maximize the space inside the bonnet the automobile manufacturers adopt these engines for their vehicles.



The above engine might be familiar to most of you since they are used in motor bikes and is in the naked manner. These are added with multiple cylinders and are used in four wheeler's. The major disadvantage of this engine is that the base area is very small and the center of mass is concentrated in between both the cylinders. This might not be a big deal during normal driving conditions, but during rain the road gets slippery due to reduction in the co-efficient of friction between tires and the tarmac. Now the rider needs to be more careful since the engine is already unstable and the sole control of the bike depends on riders stability.

All these problems could be averted by a simple modification in the engine. Instead of using vertical and v engines the engines could be modified to be horizontal. The cylinders could be made to move in a horizontal direction. Such an engine is called a horizontal engine or BOXER engine.




As you can see, the cylinders move horizontally inside the cylinder and will produce the same amount of torque like the above engines. As the motion of the pistons resemble the punching of fists by a boxer the engine gets such a name.

The base of the engine is wider and hence the center of gravity of the engine can be concentrated anywhere within the engine and thus increasing the stability if the vehicle. But the construction of such an engine is more tedious and time consuming.Also the engine occupies major area of the bonnet. So the major automobile manufacturers avoid these engines for their vehicles. Instead they bring in the Electronic Stability Program (ESP) for the vehicles in the name of safety and sophistication and ultimately increasing the cost of the vehicle.

One of the traditional users of boxer engines are the japanese car manufactures Subaru. They have perfected in the use of these engines for many years and have ensured proper development of the engine. A Subaru sedan with the basic specifications can be much safer than any other sedan with ESP and ABS. If you are going to buy a car be wise and choose a car with a boxer engine.


Gracias Amigos'

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