Modeling the inertial torque imbalance and foundation forces within an inline internal combustion engine : quantifying the equivalent mass approximation

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] The main object of this dissertation is to study the dynamic analysis of an inline internal combustion engine. This dissertation presents the kinematics and kinetic analyses of an inline internal combustion engine crank mechanism, the dynamic torque imbalance and foundation forces for a single-piston and multi-piston engines are studied as well. The objectives of this dissertation are to explore the inertial-torque characteristics and foundation forces of an inline, internal combustion engine with connecting-rod joints that are evenly spaced about the centerline of the crankshaft, and to evaluate the goodness of a mass approximation that is customarily used in machine design textbooks. In this dissertation the number of pistons within the internal combustion engine is varied from 1 to 8. In order to generalize the results, the reaction force between the ground and the crank in the x-direction and y-direction equations are nondimensionalized and shown to depend upon only six nondimensional groups, all related to the mass and geometry properties of the connecting rod and crank while the reaction force between the connecting rod and the piston in the x-direction y-direction, reaction force between the crank and the connecting rod in the x-direction y-direction, reaction force between the piston and the cylinder wall, and the inertial-torque equations are nondimensionalized all related to the mass and geometry properties of the connecting rod. As shown in this dissertation, the largest torque imbalance is exhibited by a 2-piston engine. The next largest torque imbalance is exhibited by a 3-piston engine, followed by a single-piston engine (this is not monotonic). The largest foundation forces are exhibited by a single-piston engine. The next largest foundation forces are exhibited by a 2-piston engine, followed by a 3e-piston engine, and that a dramatic reduction in the foundation forces and torque imbalance may be obtained by using 4 or more pistons in the design, when using as many as 8 pistons the foundation forces and torque imbalance essentially vanishes. It should be observed that the mass approximation captures 100 percent of the variability of the actual torque imbalance for engines that are designed with an odd number of pistons equal to or greater than three. The mass approximation captures 100 percent of the variability of the actual reaction force between the piston and cylinder wall for engines that are designed with single-piston and multi-pistons. The mass approximation captures 100 percent of the variability of the actual reaction force against piston pin for engines that are designed with single-piston. It is also shown in this dissertation that the customary mass approximations for the connecting rod may be used to simplify the analysis for all engine designs without a significant loss of modeling accuracy.