Motors 101: Building the Chevy Smallblock
The V-8 engine is so-named because of its shape. Hold up your hands. Put the butt of both palms together and make a V shape--that's how an engine sits your car. Hold your thumbs in, leaving four fingers upright on each side. Those are the four cylinders. (Many engines have only four cylinders, and so have a different shaped motor).
Inside the cylinders are pistons. Each cylinder has one. A piston goes up and down inside the cylinder, and its flat, round top compresses a mixture--a mist--of gas and air.
The gas and air are let into the top of the cylinders via the the "heads". There are two heads--think of them as a four-hole cover–that sit on top the V-8 block. In the heads, there are 8 valves. Valves look golf tees, only larger, and are made of smooth steel. Each cylinder has two valves. One valve (the bigger one) lets in the gas-air mixture. The smaller, exhaust valve is needed, because a spark plug (one for each cylinder) sparks, and the gas-air mix explodes.
The explosion inside the cylinder is called combustion (hence, the "internal combustion" engine). The force of that explosion drives the piston downward, turning the crankshaft below. The pistons fire in a particular order.
Back to your hands and fingers, let's number your fingers on the right hand 2,4,6,8. On the left hand, 1,3 5, 7. The firing order in the Chevrolet engine is 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2. Try waggling your fingers in that order!
All the pistons are hooked to the crankshaft on the bottom of engine. The crankshaft looks like a short section of dinosaur's spine--and it has the same crucial function. It holds everything together, and helps transfers power. Eventually that power goes through the transmission to the drive shaft, to the axles, to the wheels--and move you down the highway....
Enough for today, class. See pictures of engine block, heads, valves and etc. in the photo album. And good news: there is no Quiz!!!!
Posted by Will Weaver at 2/9/2009 8:16 AM 
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: v-8 engine cylinders pistons heads internal combustion engine block Chevrolet engine
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: v-8 engine cylinders pistons heads internal combustion engine block Chevrolet engine
I'm a middle school librarian and we're checking to see if our students can practice blogging on your motorblog...you'll be visiting these same students in May! Yay!
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I like working on engines did you know me and my dad are going to build my first car?He said we are going to work on an old mustang GT.I was so excited when he told me I was ready to get on the road but we didn't even have a engine.I can't wait for you to come to my school I really want to se your car all the pictures look cool.
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