Why the one-piece crankcase and cylinder jacket combination of the
1903 engine was abandoned for the individual cylinder construction can
only be surmised. The difference in weight was probably slight, as the
inherent weight advantage of the original crankcase casting was
largely offset by the relatively heavy valve boxes, and the difference
in the total amount of machining required, because of the separate
valve boxes, cages, and attaching parts, also was probably slight.
Although the crankcase had shown itself to be structurally weak, this
could have been cared for by proper strengthening. The 1903 design did
have some fundamental disadvantages: it required a fairly complex
pattern and expensive casting, plus some difficult machining, part of
which had to be very accurate in order to maintain both gas and water
joints tight; and the failure of any one cylinder that affected the
jacket meant a complete crankcase replacement.
It seems probable that a change was initially made mandatory by their
intention to utilize the ported exhaust feature, the value of which
they had proved in the experimental engine. The separate one-piece
water jacket construction they had arrived at in this engine was
available, but once the decision to change was made, the individual
cylinder with its shrunk-on jacket had much to commend it--simplicity,
cost, ease of manufacture and assembly and attachment, and
serviceability. The advantages of the auxiliary, or ported, exhaust
were not obtained without cost, however, as the water jacket around
the barrel could not very easily be extended below the ports. Thus,
even though the water was carried as high as possible on the upper
end, a large portion of the barrel was left uncooled, and the lack of
cooling at the lower end, in conjunction with the uncooled portion of
the head, meant that only approximately half the entire cylinder
surface was cooled directly.
The piston was generally the same as in the 1903 engine, except that
six radial ribs were added on the under side of the head, tapering
from maximum thickness at the center to nothing near the wall. They
were probably incorporated as an added path for heat to flow from the
center of the piston toward the outside, as their shape was not the
best use of material for strength. The piston pin was locked in the
piston by the usual set screw, but here no provision was made for the
alternate practice of clamping the rod on the pin. This piston-pin
setscrew construction had become a standard arrangement in automobile
practice. The piston rings were the normal wide design of that time,
with what would now be considered a low unit pressure.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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