Aircraft Piston Engine Design and Performance

AIRCRAFT PISTON ENGINE DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE
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Introduction
An aircraft piston engine also often known as reciprocating engine or otherwise a recip
refers to a combustion engine which makes use of a single or multiple reciprocating piston in the
conversion of pressure into rotational motion. The aircraft piston engine works using the same
principles as those of the engines which are common in most of the automobiles. Nonetheless,
modifications including dual ignition systems used in the enhancement of redundancy as well as
safety and the air cooling used in the reduction of weight have been included into the engines
that are designed for the purposes of aviation use (El-Sayed, 2017). In some cases, turbocharges
and in very rare cases superchargers may be added to the piston engines so as to enhance
performance. In most case, aircraft piston engines are fuels using AVGAS even though diesel
engines are gaining popularity mostly in light aircraft.
Figure 1: Aircraft piston engine (El-Sayed, 2017)
Types of Engines

There have been tremendous changes in the engine design over the last century since the
invention of the first powered flight. Most of the engines that are installed in the current
generation aircraft are majorly of horizontally opposed configuration. Nonetheless, there are
illustrations of all these engine kinds which are still flying in vintage, production as well
experimental aircraft. Among the engine types include in-line engines, v-type engines, rotary
engines, radial engines as well as horizontally opposed engines (Carlucci, Ficarella & Trullo,
2016).
Components/Design of an aircraft piston engine
Cylinder: This defines the enclosed space where combustion occurs. There are several
ways of arrangement of cylinders including single row arrangement, W-shape arrangement, a V-
shape arrangement as well as flat or horizontal arrangement
Pistons: These are often attached to every cylinder. Pistons slide up and down, a motion
that leads to rotary motion. The wall of a piston is often grooved to aid in holding the rings
which tightly fit against each wall thereby preventing the escape of gases from the combustion
chamber (Ostapski, Wierzchoń, Rudnicki & Dowkontt, 2017).

Figure 2: Components of engine and brief description: Extracted from (Sadraey, 2017)
Connecting Rod is used in the linkage of the crankcase which is held by crankshaft and
the piston. The connecting rod is used in the turning of a propeller when connected to a rotary
motion piston. The overall result is a rotary motion being experienced by the crankshaft.
Crankshaft is used in the transformation of the up and down movement of the piston into
a rotary motion. The crankshaft generates rotary motion when connected to the piston using a
connecting rod even as the piston experiences an up and down movement (Sadraey, 2017). The
piston is pulled downward an intake stroke in the piston engine lead to the creation of a vacuum
in the chamber of the cylinder. Such a back and forward motion generates rotary movement in
crankshaft even as the pressure levels in the cylinder are varied.