3D-Printed Pistons

[groberts101]

Aside from materials, casting/die techniques and subsequent resolution improvements through the years.. multi axis cnc machinery has been worth its weight in gold to further our abilities to make more intricate and well aimed components. This 3d printing stuff is absolutely no different and takes us beyond what any cnc machine can possibly do. Probably why koenigsegg spent so much R$D to print their variable turbo housings out of 2 different metals.

Most of us here won't even be around anymore when it really matures in metallurgy capabilities and shows its true merits. And just as some here are doing now.. people then will be saying that the newest next best thing like "mini-nanobot lasers" aren't any better or worth their potential for tech advancements either. It's a narrow minded perspective based on the current generation looking at it. Too busy looking back at where we came from and complacency with "good enough for the current task at hand" of where we currently are with things.

IMHO, if money availability and capitalism wasn't involved so heavily in our bias.. we'd surely be much further ahead technologically than we currently are. There's often a better way to design or fabricate something.. but when it interferes with our ability to make more money?.. that idea quickly loses its shiny luster.

[roc]

IMHO, if money availability and capitalism wasn't involved so heavily in our bias.. we'd surely be much further ahead technologically than we currently are. There's often a better way to design or fabricate something.. but when it interferes with our ability to make more money?.. that idea quickly loses its shiny luster.

IMHO, one of the best posts I ever read at SpeedTalk (or the the entire interweb)

[NewbVetteGuy]

The basic method has become commonplace to create integral cooling passages in dies and tooling for industry.
Also for fabrication of turbine blades with integral cooling passages.

One possibility I have not seen is to create closed cooling passages, rather than open ones that use engine oil.
There is a device called a heat pipe, that takes advantage of the heat absorbed/released by a phase change
in the cooling medium, solid-liquid, or liquid to gas.
Sodium filled valves are an example of how this works.
But liquid-gas can transfer as much as 10x more than convection, and could be integrated into heat pipe enabled pistons.

You blew my mind for a second

Been used in desktop computer CPU coolers for like 2 decades now:

Adam

[NewbVetteGuy]

With an ornately designed piston crown shape and 3D printed pistons, could you help control swirl/ tumble and quench areas very closely?

-I think of the long threads on singh grooves and then compare it to what's possible with a 3D Printed Piston Crown and it's another universe.


Adam

[hoffman900]

With an ornately designed piston crown shape and 3D printed pistons, could you help control swirl/ tumble and quench areas very closely?

-I think of the long threads on singh grooves and then compare it to what's possible with a 3D Printed Piston Crown and it's another universe.


Adam

The piston top isn’t the advantage. You can machine that currently with the current crop of CNC machines.

The printed and other casting techniques allows engineers to develop parts that are hollow or feature ornate cooling passages that will allow for lighter parts and better cooling. Both will allow for better wear as well as increased performance. The performance may not be as clear cut, but will likely allow designers to do other things that will add up to performance enhancements. Take a look at the Rolls Royce jet turbine blades for example.

For example, specially shaped passages and piston oil jets could allow for thinner rings and a more aggressive tune for a given service life. These enhancements are all well documented in high end racing series where builders have more liberty on design. Think FIA Le Mans, Moto GP, F1, etc. Will it matter for the ST typical 500hp 383ci Chevy? No, but those are boring and pretty archaic anyway.

Take a look here from a decade ago with Honda's F1 effort and what piston cooling got them: www.f1-forecast.com/pdf/F1-Files/Honda/F1-SP2_08e.pdf . They spent a lot of time on oil the oil jet pattern.

As far as mixture motion goes, look no further than the current crop of sport bikes. They’re all in the 12.5-14.1 compression range from the factory on pump gas. Plenty of tumble action to get there, and on the small bore 600 bikes, they’re coming with 15,000rpm redlines from the factory. Combustion speed isn’t a problem, despite the relative large bore/stroke ratios. That’s all in the port design / angle and the combustion chamber to some degree.

An example of that, look at the previous Superbike Ducati V2 1299cc (79.2ci):
Bore: 116mm (4.566in)
Stroke: 60.8mm (2.393in)
Connecting Rod Length: 110.1mm (4.335in)
Compression Ratio: 12.6:1 (street trim).
Redline: 11,000rpm

1.90 bore/stroke ratio
1.81 rod/stroke ratio




That's a bigger bore than a GM LT-1 by almost half an inch, a full point higher compression for the same fuel, 5000rpm+ more, and without the aid of DI at lower engine speeds.

Not a Singh-groove in sight.

I wish we saw more threads like this here. We use to.

[englertracing]

The basic method has become commonplace to create integral cooling passages in dies and tooling for industry.
Also for fabrication of turbine blades with integral cooling passages.

One possibility I have not seen is to create closed cooling passages, rather than open ones that use engine oil.
There is a device called a heat pipe, that takes advantage of the heat absorbed/released by a phase change
in the cooling medium, solid-liquid, or liquid to gas.
Sodium filled valves are an example of how this works.
But liquid-gas can transfer as much as 10x more than convection, and could be integrated into heat pipe enabled pistons.

You blew my mind for a second

Been used in desktop computer CPU coolers for like 2 decades now:

Adam

Im aware,
Im involved with large phase change processes

But the though of a heat piped piston made my brain flip over in my head

[hoffman900]

I think of it more like what Rolls Royce is doing with their compressor turbine blades:


Like that, but maybe oil? Cosworth and others have been trying stuff like that since the 1980s. I believe some heavy duty diesel pistons do this as well.

Check out these R&D steel diesel pistons with sodium/potassium channels: http://www.bine.info/en/topics/publikat ... 7&type=333

[HDBD]

The ability to produce a part does not mean it is a workable substitute or improved product. The working standards, strength of materials, lag what can actually be 3d printed or made on hybrid machining centers.

Rolls Royce Trent series commercial jet turbine designs feature blades with hollow internal structures for cooling. They’re mass produced. No doubt GE/CFM, etc. have similar stuff going on.

https://youtu.be/aFRdp1Js9Kc

Thanks I wasn't aware of that. I do know many 3d parts are used for testing and product development. SOme are even more cost effective that machining for interior components because of machining time saved and less scrap.

[barrybasinger]

...
IMHO, if money availability and capitalism wasn't involved so heavily in our bias.. we'd surely be much further ahead technologically than we currently are. There's often a better way to design or fabricate something.. but when it interferes with our ability to make more money?.. that idea quickly loses its shiny luster....

A little off-topic, as it's not exactly "technology-related" as we usually understand it on ST, but (imo), the biggest effect of 3D printing when it fully matures will not be on the availability of the parts themselves, but on the major impact on the Distribution and Warehousing industries, as well as those that are secondary to them, such as manufacture of trucks and trailers, shipping containers, etc. When we can locally/regionally produce parts on demand from parts files sent over the net, why do we need a warehouse to store them in? Why not just have regional printing centers in high-demand areas? Why do we need trucking companies when we can print stuff we need in our local area? Brother-in-law is a Product Manger for one of the biggies in the 3D printing industry, and we have these discussions all the time. It'll be a while before the materials and technology are good enough to support high-volume production for high-stress parts--but the potential reduction in costs of distribution may speed up the process. jmo

[peejay]

The basic method has become commonplace to create integral cooling passages in dies and tooling for industry.
Also for fabrication of turbine blades with integral cooling passages.

One possibility I have not seen is to create closed cooling passages, rather than open ones that use engine oil.
There is a device called a heat pipe, that takes advantage of the heat absorbed/released by a phase change
in the cooling medium, solid-liquid, or liquid to gas.
Sodium filled valves are an example of how this works.
But liquid-gas can transfer as much as 10x more than convection, and could be integrated into heat pipe enabled pistons.

You blew my mind for a second

Been used in desktop computer CPU coolers for like 2 decades now:

Adam

I used a minifridge as a computer case once, close to 20 years ago. The ultimate in phase-change computer cooling.

As it turned out, the minifridge was not capable of moving enough BTUs to make the effort worthwhile (other than braggin' rights). I suppose I could have hotrodded the fridge with a larger condenser from a full size fridge or something, but I found that replacing the side panel of a fullheight tower case with a box fan worked really well and required a lot less screwing around.

[NewbVetteGuy]

You blew my mind for a second

Been used in desktop computer CPU coolers for like 2 decades now:

Adam

I used a minifridge as a computer case once, close to 20 years ago. The ultimate in phase-change computer cooling.

As it turned out, the minifridge was not capable of moving enough BTUs to make the effort worthwhile (other than braggin' rights). I suppose I could have hotrodded the fridge with a larger condenser from a full size fridge or something, but I found that replacing the side panel of a fullheight tower case with a box fan worked really well and required a lot less screwing around.

There are direct phase change CPU coolers and even multiple loop cascading CPU coolers; way better way to go vs. chilling the air and using chilled air to cool the CPU. I had a 1/2 HP dehumidifier chilling RV antifreeze and pumped it through a liquid CPU water block cooler, motherboard northbridge, and GPU waterblock with an aquarium water pump (reservoir was a 2L Igloo cooler) antifreeze was at -20 before I'd boot the PC. With a couple of volt mods on my Abit IC7 MB I had a Pentium 4 2.4C 2.4ghz Costa Rica chip booting into Windows at 4 ghz and posting at 4.2 ghz. -It was a world record for that chip at the time on only chilled liquid cooling; it was my daily computer on air cooling with a heatsink very similar to the one in this thread @ 3.6-3.8ghz, depending upon winter or summer "room temps". I can't imagine what that chip would've done under LN2... Now we're getting into hot rodding computers and a totally different type of "SpeedTalk", though. (This was before unlocked CPU multipliers so you had to contend with MB north bridge front-side bus speeds, so it was way harder then than when unlocked multipliers came out with the Core Intel chips...)

I spent my teens and 20s hot rodding and hacking computers, late 20s and early 30s "hacking" beer and electric breweries, now in my late 30s I'm starting to get into engines. -I think it was the right order given the budgets required to play with engines vs. beer making vs. computers.




Adam

[midnightbluS10]

Printed for display fine, other wise at this point I don't even think I would trust them in a 2 cylcle model airplane motor!
Also it takes a hell of a long time to print something up like that which sky rockets price!

Why not? They can be made with steel, aluminum, inconel, titanium, tool steels, all kinds of different materials. I only mention the other stuff as examples of other metals they print with. Not that anyone would want them or have a use for them.

For example, under certain conditions, some 3D printed stainless is up to 3x stronger than stainless parts made by conventional techniques.