Any sources on building endurance racing engines?

"Grindintosecond" (Grindintosecond) 04/08/2018 at 23:34 • Filed to: None

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I’ve got plenty of books on the shelf on tuning and boosting and charging and building powerful engines but none of the engines built that way would last the 25 hours of Thunderhill, or 24 at Daytona or LeMans or complete a 5 mile run at 80psi at Bonneville without melting a piston, blowing gaskets, spinning bearings, etc. So, where is the guidance if someone wants to really make a lasting race engine? Something that will take the punishment and go forever at it’s design full tilt.

If only EssExTee could be so grossly incandescent > Grindintosecond 04/08/2018 at 23:42

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I would imagine it’s largely just replacing as many components as possible with higher strength versions.

Arch Duke Maxyenko, Shit Talk Extraordinaire > Grindintosecond 04/08/2018 at 23:45

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Don’t over stress components.

jimz > Grindintosecond 04/08/2018 at 23:51

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first you must find someone willing to give you millions of dollars to work on this. then you need to find people who know how to design such an engine. Then you need to make sure those people are humble enough to go back to the drawing board when their design craps out.

gettingoldercarguy > Grindintosecond 04/08/2018 at 23:56

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What type of engine are you racing?

Urambo Tauro > Grindintosecond 04/08/2018 at 23:58

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I don’t know about specific guidance, only that everything matters. Everything you know about engines has to be done to a T. Strong components, strategic choices in materials, precision machining & balancing, proper assembly & fastener torque, good lubrication, heat management, etc...

NKato > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 00:07

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If you want to examine a good basis for an endurance engine, look at Ford’s 4.6L Modular. My crown Vic’ s 2-valve may be anemic in comparison to other engines, but it is rock solid.

Beyond that, if you’re designing something from the ground up, here’s a general tip: take the mechanical tolerances of the design that you think are reasonable, and multiply it by 5 to 10 times. There is a reason why Koenigsegg says their Spyker engines could last forever if they were detuned.

Manwich - now Keto-Friendly > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 00:10

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Here’s my suggestion... build an engine to handle 20psi of boost... then run it without boost.

And that’s my 2 cents.

atfsgeoff > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 00:14

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lower the redline, reduce forced induction boost. Pretty easy.

Then beef up your cooling systems. Make sure all fluids are kept cool. Coolant, engine oil, transmission fluid. Make sure their corresponding heat exchangers can readily shed the heat of driving at the limit in 120F ambient temperature, indefinitely.

bhtooefr > Manwich - now Keto-Friendly 04/09/2018 at 05:37

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Although that may mean heavier components in the rotating assembly, which will increase stresses when running at higher RPM.

nafsucof > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 05:59

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start with an engine designed for racing from the get go. something like the nissan maxima engine from the early 90s, or something that someone like cosworth specializes in so support is available. the use of off the shelf parts help to keep costs down. how much power do you need?

nafsucof > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 06:01

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i’m sure there are lots of engine builders out there that don’t put their info down on paper.

CRider > Arch Duke Maxyenko, Shit Talk Extraordinaire 04/09/2018 at 07:05

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This is why so many high horsepower engines run on alcohol You gotta keep ‘em happy, and an open bar is a good way to do that.

RacinBob > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 07:37

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Give them plentiful supplies of oil and water, preferably not mixed.

RacinBob > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 07:39

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Have them designed and built by Honda. (Note, this applies to street and Indycar, not F1)

RacinBob > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 07:40

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Make sure the driver can tell the difference between 5th and 3rd gear.

Manwich - now Keto-Friendly > bhtooefr 04/09/2018 at 07:47

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Unless you install a rev limiter 2000rpm below what is safe!

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 08:21

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Build a beefy race engine and then start dialing it back until it lasts the full race.

kanadanmajava1 > NKato 04/09/2018 at 08:55

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Many racing engines have tolerances designed so that they cannot be cold started. They are warmed up using external heating unit that circulates oil and/or cooland in the engine. These can be also used to keep the engine in constant warmed up state. I think most F1 teams keep their engines heated up days before and after they are used.

Keeping every moving part lubricated is probably the most important thing in a racing engine. This besides lubricates parts, also cools (or warms) up components too. Dry sump system with a large oil reservoir and multi stage pump is a good way to keep large amount of oil always available and not have the crankshafts splashing in a huge volume of wildly moving oil.

Material quality is another important thing. Cheap stuff can fail but so does expensive stuff. Maybe not so often but they do fail too. so sourcing the best possible parts is a very important.

I’m very big fan of toggle switches. But not anything goes. In a Youtube one Swedish guy was taking apart electric system parts from an F1 race car. I spotted a really good looking Apem toggle switch and the part number was visible. I went searching for it and did find nearly similar version. Apparently the hat part was a custom order model but the most similar switch costed ~$170. You can get 100 cheap switches for that price and all would serve the same function. But quality is more important racing. If an operating switch keeps the car running but a failed one doesn’t the switch needs to be reliable as any other part in the car.

And with a racing engine this applies to all of its parts. Every part has to designed so that their failure rate is minimal If there is a part which failure doesn’t matter it’s an useless part and doesn’t belong to a racing engine. Some parts can of course have a backup.

Captain of the Enterprise > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 08:56

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Maybe Tune to Win by Caroll Smith would have advice

Duck Duck Grey Duck FTMFW! > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 10:50

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I feel like blueprinting the engine would be very beneficial. I know an engine builder that I could ask if he had any advice.

Grindintosecond > RacinBob 04/09/2018 at 17:51

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Honda had serious issues in the indy500 last year. Alonzo suffered from it.

RacinBob > Grindintosecond 04/09/2018 at 19:13

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Ok, You are correct, Exclude Indy Cars driven by Alonso too.........:)

Kanaric > Grindintosecond 04/13/2018 at 15:10

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I know a guy who had been doing amateur endurance racing for years using just a RB20DET that was stock with a 20G. Rev limiter bumped to 8000rpm.

Car ran great, until it started on fire one day, but that was after almost 10 years of doing this. A pure case of the Japanese don’t make them like they used to. I don’t think any modern Japanese engine would survive that long in those conditions.

He pretty much ran almost every setup possible on that RB20. Various kinds of intakes, manifolds, turbos, etc. Electrical fire destroyed it lol. He was going to do a rebuild with Tomei internals, solid lifters, tomei procams, head porting, and using a larger turbo. However I think he uses a different engine now.