Somender-Singh Grooves

[CaptainHenreh]

Any of you guys ever hear of this? I read about this ages ago, forgot about it, and it came back up on GRM.Basically, this Indian guy Claims to have pretty much re-invented the wheel when it comes to piston internal combustion engines.

Here's his theory.

If you were a piston, this is what you'd see in the ignition cycle:


So he's got this idea that if you cut grooves in the cylinder head, you can increase the flame propagation speed:


This, he says, results in lower emissions from increased combustion of fuel and longer engine life from the piston spending a reduced time under combustion.

Here's another picture from PopSci:


Now, he's reduced the squish area pretty significantly, and if you took two cylinder heads, one with grooves and one without, the one with grooves would have a slightly higher compression ratio (maybe significantly higher) so could that be creating the extra power? What do you guys think? It wouldn't be the first time an important technology has been discovered independently, and combustion physics are still pretty poorly understood. We really don't know much about what happens when the spark plug goes off.

Snake oil? Or revolution? What do you guys think?





For a primer, you can read here: Click-Pow!

The website is here: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://somender-singh.com/">http://somender-singh.com/</a><!-- m -->

[Andy]

I read about this in PopSci as well. I hope it true. I remember reading about how a few car companies patented "similar" head grooves around the same time this guy was getting press.

[.RJ]

This has been around for a while. I think its snake oil... the manufacturers with millions of $$ in engine and F1 development arent doing it. Nothing of the sort is done on Moto GP engines. Maybe its something that works on low-tech engines....

FWIW, reducing squish area (increasing quench) is a good thing, to a point. No idea if he's gone too far according to the drawings.

[BLINGMW]

I remember reading something about that a while ago as well, I guess from the Pop Sci actually. I wouldn't base much on that picture there. I can only imagine his findings would have any sense of validity if the compression ratio stayed the same.

I guess if it worked, some engine manufacturer would already be doing it, doing something better than it, or hiring him. :?:

[ScottyB]

wouldn't the grooves concentrate a ton of heat on one particular area of the piston since the explosion will move along that path with such regularity? that could get scary. also, pistons don't stay sparkly fresh, they get nice carbon deposits and junk, which i think would fill in the those pretty grooves to some extent and basically turn it back into a flat piston.

as for that whacked out combustion chamber, have fun mounting valves in that. in order to take a reasonable path from the cam lobe i imagine the valve might not even be symetrical when viewed from the side -- expensive.

[ViPER1313]

I know that a company named OceanPro (an after-market Jetski parts manufacturer) uses the same principle to make more power out of their 2-cycle heads.

[Maengelito]

i've read about this before awhile back. i think in theory its sounds reasonable, because you want as much mixing of air and fuel in the cylinders as possible for an even uniform burn, but as scotty points out, there are several issues that can come up as a result. perhaps it is effective at making power, but the trade off for engine life maybe too much for it to be really worth it. but i dont back any of this up with any scientific data so i could be wrong. as has been stated before, if big companies that spend tons of money in R&D arent doing it even though they know about it, its probably not worth it.

[PGK]

Just because large corporations or organizations with huge R/D budgets aren't doing something doesn't mean it's a bad idea. Money doesn't turn ineptitude to cleverness.

that being said, this may/may not be a good idea.

in the article Mr. Singh claimed that after he cut some grooves in the cylinder head of a motorcycle he was racing, it ran drastically cooler. This is the primary advantage of his systemÔÇöcooler running, more thermally efficient motors.

I guess if it worked, some engine manufacturer would already be doing it, doing something better than it, or hiring him.

ehh, not so much. he's shopped the idea around to a lot of companies, and they've all given him an answer similar to RJ's 'snake oil' reaction. Can't really blame them, when someone from a dirt-floored workshop in India with no formal education comes to them claiming to have revolutionized the internal combustion engine. right.

his ideas make sense. There isn't anything inherently wrong with them, and if his claims are true, this is a technology worth pursuing. The reason they haven't been implemented has nothing to do with their own merit.

[.RJ]

in the article Mr. Singh claimed that after he cut some grooves in the cylinder head of a motorcycle he was racing, it ran drastically cooler. This is the primary advantage of his systemÔÇöcooler running, more thermally efficient motors

Gas engines make more power, fewer emissions and are more efficient at higher temperatures/compression ratios. If you just make the engine run cooler you arent getting anywhere. Unless you're dealing with something thats pretty low-tech to begin with.