New Civics to have Direct Injection + Atkinson valve behavior, 45mpg?
 

Src, google:"Honda Previews New Engine Lineup: Direct Injection and CVTs Coming"

Looks like new cars from Honda are finally going to have Direct Injected engines, and these OTTO cycle engines can also function as Atkinson cycle engines when demand is low (compression stroke is shorter than power stroke) for even more fuel savings. They give an estimated 10% fuel savings, so maybe 45MPG highway for the regular Civic?
The primary mode for the engine is OTTO, then secondary is Atkinson.
I like. Now we just have to wait for homogeneous stratified charge OTTO cycle engines..no spark plugs during low demand so it functions like a diesel .. 14:1 compression or so. Beyond this, there isn't anything else you can do to an OTTO cycle to make it more efficient (from what I've researched).
Diesel fuel powered Atkinson engines are one idea, or higher compression with OTTO cycle maybe.

The new Civic will have 148HP instead of the now 140HP. I think the engine will start with the 2013 cars.

If they put the new 1.8L in the Civic, then they could very well get better than the 42MPGhwy that the Chevy Cruze gets, making the Civic the most efficient non-hybrid non-diesel compact car out there. If it can get 44MPGhwy, then it'll best the 43MPGhwy VW TDI.

The current Civic with the aerodynamic mods is rated at 41MPGhwy and so I think it's entirely possible to get to 44MPGhwy or higher with that model with the new engine, and at least meeting the Chevy Cruze with the non-eco Civics (from 39MPGhwy to 42MPGhwy).

...sounds V-E-R-Y interesting. The Cruze 1.4LT doesn't have DI (yet), but rumors are that it'll probably get it in model year 2013.

I'll believe it when I see it on the dealer lot. Honda has been BSing about DI for years. Good luck playing catch up.

DI in the garage, 100k warranty. 5-60 free roadside assistance.

regards
Mech

new ford focus with ecoboost coming out with gasoline direct injection

An interesting item and it will be also interesting to know how much of the fuel savings will be due to the engine and how much to the CVT.

Peter.

danwat1234 -

Would this be similar to the HCCI stuff that GM has been fiddling with? :

GM's HCCI engines now run from idle to 60 mph!

CarloSW2

How can a compression stroke be shorter than a power stroke? Are the con-rods variable length or the crankshaft morphs?

Also, why haven't gasoline engines been DI from the beginning, with no spark plug?

Last question, what is the difference between OTTO and Atkinson?

It seems to me the most efficient car would have a puny motor (3 cylinder 1L perhaps) and a turbo charger. Make this diesel with electric assist and regen and you would have one heck of an efficient vehicle.

...because Diesel engines rely upon the 'self-ignition' point of fuel to run so no ignition-system is needed; and, they produce LOT's of torque but only at slow speeds (typically <3-4,000 rpm).

...Gasoline engines require a spark-ignition system (coil, distributor, wiring, plugs) to ignite the air-fuel mixture at a precise(*) timing so that they can achieve much higher engine speeds (6-7,000 rpm) and thus higher power (but not torque) than Diesel engines.

...even the "new" HCCI engines (diesel-like operation using gasoline) will use BOTH Compression Ignition (CI) (at light loads) and Spark Ignition (SI) (at high loads) operation...Direct Injection (DI) with gasoline is "trickier" than with diesel, because of gasolines' lower self-combustion temperature.

...why SI before DI? It was easier to get electricity to occur quickly than it was to get mechanical injectors to squirt quickly.



(*) = gasoline engine power is very sensitive to changes in ignition timing.

Wonderful explanation, thank you.

It's my understanding that diesel engines operate at lower RPM because the fuel burns more slowly. This implies that if they operated at higher RPM the fuel/air mixture would be evacuated from the cylinder before it completely burned.

With the injection technology of today, wouldn't it be possible to precisely inject fuel at the higher RPM range that gasoline engines turn? Increasing the CR to allow for CI in a gasoline engine would produce more torque would it not? Exchanging greater torque for fewer maximum RPM seems like a good trade off.

Q1: When the engine is in Atkinson cycle mode, the intake valve is open part way through the compression stroke, so some of the air comes back out to the ait manifold thing, then the intake valve closes and compression happens but the compression stroke in this case is shorter than the power stroke.

Q2: DI does not mean no spark plug, DI just means fuel is injected straight into the cylinder. No spark plug in a gas engine requires lots and lots of sensors and a fair amount of computation power. DI, I don't know why it hasn't been implemented from the beginning. Some cars many many years ago had DI but I don't why they didn't continue to have DI.

Q3:See Q1. With OTTO cycle, the intake valve is closed all the way thru the compression stroke, so compression stroke is around the same length as power stroke.

Here is the original Atkinson cycle conceived to get around Otto's patents.

Animated Engines - Atkinson

Modern engines achieve a similar effect with cam timing and offset crankshaft journals.

Direct Injection was used on the DB 601 engine in the ME 109 of WW2 fame.
The original Flathead Ford engine of 1932 had an offset crankshaft.
CVTs mostly go back to the Van Dorne belt patent of the mid 1950s.

Nothing new here and Honda has been in decline since old man Honda died in 1991. Back then they really tried some cutting edge engineering, now they are more like GM in decline, riding their laurels since about 2000 when the first Insight came out.

My 94 VX was a great car. the 2002 Insight was neat but had a lot of warranty issues $7k in work in 1 year. Honda kept timing belts too long as well as interference engines.

Probably get slammed for this post, but that is just the way I feel about new Hondas. My 84 CRX was fantastic. The 77 Accord the old man drove up and down US 1 in the Florida Keys averaged right at 40 MPG.

The best of them all was the VX, a truly marvelous piece of engineering. After that peak they have not really done anything that I would come close to calling really innovative, and bragging about ancient technology just convinces me the whole thing is a propaganda campaign.

The new Prius 3 I think, lightweight with the old 1.5 engine and low 50s combined MPG at just under 20k is going to send the 2nd gen Insight to the scrap heap.

regards
Mech

...wonder if those new Honda engines will also be Flex-Fuel capable, ie: equipped with re-sized fuel injectors and wide-range exhaust O2-sensor(s)?

While Honda is in a bit of a rut, I think they're not too badly off in terms of technology... the R-series engines are pretty good, and the integrated exhaust manifold and EGR were pretty nifty when first introduced. The L-series engines in the first-generation Fit with dual spark made for some pretty impressive economy numbers, though the CVT was a real stinker when it came to maintenance and longevity. The problem is, everyone is catching up and leapfrogging them, while they've basically had the same engines for the past seven to eight years.

I think the difference is in the injection pressures and the benefits derived from the higher pressures you can get out of new injectors.

I recall that Mitsubishi had some of the first modern, electronically controlled direct injection engines in the 90's (contrary to Audi's claims), but they didn't continue with them. Shame. Some of those engines were very good, and included some innovative touches like continuously variable radiator fans (a pain to wire up when you were swapping one of these babies in).

Wouldn't the cvt hinder fuel economy? My room mate got a Nissan cube with cvt as a rental once after he hit a deer, and at 45 mph the engine was at 4500 rpm. Wouldn't running wide open at cruising speeds like that be worse than shifting? Maybe i'm wrong, someone please enlighten me

He did something wrong. That sounds like about 3k too high an RPM at 45.
Should be 15-1700.

regards
Mech

I love/d Hondas and I won't slam you for this criticism. I have become really disappointed with the Hondas. The CR-Z looks great but the last Honda that really wowed me was the 2001 Insight. I'm looking more at the Hyundais and Fords these days--partly on your adivce on these pages I think. If something happens to this old Honda of mine... those are the brands I'm looking at. I just want to be lucky not to get my Civic totaled until the 3-banger Fiesta turbo is a couple years old and on the used lots.

I would agree with all you wrote.

Early to mid 90's hondas are truly amazing. Solid, quality cars.

I just did some research. The D series engine was introduced in 1984.

It was last used in 2006. Pretty amazing.

Like Old Mechanic says, that sounds wrong. Small cars with CVTs are usually doing 2.5 - 3k at 60 mph.

CVTs are just like any other transmission... the final ratio is what decides your cruising rpms in top gear. Bigger engined cars with CVTs usually have lower cruising rpms than smaller ones, to take advantage of the extra torque.

Honda's CVTs have excellent economy, just as good as their manuals or better in the real world, but the clutch packs are problematic over the long term.

There have been direct-injected gasoline engines for quite a while; see the 1954 Mercedes 300SL (the coupes were the famous "Gullwing" cars). These systems were based on modified diesel injection systems of the era.

Similar Mechanical Fuel Injection systems were used on a number of early sports cars, like the Porsche 911 (starting with the 911E in 1968), the BMW 2002tii (starting I think in 1972?), and a number of Alfa Romeos and other Italian cars. (The Porsches used Bosch MFI pumps; the BMW used a Kugelfischer system, and the Italians used systems by Spica.) Some quality time with Google can show you how complex they truly were.

MFI was also used on quite a number of race cars in the 60s and 70s.

Some American cars used a very simple fuel injection system in the 60s, but it didn't really make a huge impact on the mass market. (Google "corvette fuelie" for one example.)

All of these bar the last were relatively expensive and difficult to tune, as well as only providing a moderate amount of control over the air-fuel mixture. Even the "simple" system used on the American cars was more expensive and more finicky than the carburetors of the day.

Carbs were much simpler, much less expensive, and offered reasonable driveability and easy tuning.

Electronics have only relatively recently progressed to the point where the very precise mixture control offered by modern-style DI could be supported reliably. (Even then it isn't necessarily as reliable as we could want. Google up "MINI high-pressure fuel pump" to see a common failure point on DI MINIs.) Solenoid valves (electrically-operated valves) that can deal well with the 1000+ PSI that DI requires have been very expensive until recently, especially ones that can last like we expect our cars to last these days.


...As often is the case, the primary answer to a question that starts "Why do they..." is: Money. :D

-soD