has anyone else heard of these? they look pretty awesome. can't think why no one has thought of these as an alternative to valves and valve springs before.

as far as i can tell, you've got a cam, but instead of lobes, its just full of hole to allow air to flow through.

http://www.rotonusa.com/animations.html

http://www.blitzworld.co.uk/content.php?categoryId=122

i'd like to see a full range of these to cover all the popular engines

god i sound like a salesman, they're nothing to do with me obviously, they look really good to me though

quote:

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Originally posted by blakep82
has anyone else heard of these? they look pretty awesome. can't think why no one has thought of these as an alternative to valves and valve springs before.

as far as i can tell, you've got a cam, but instead of lobes, its just full of hole to allow air to flow through.

http://www.rotonusa.com/animations.html

http://www.blitzworld.co.uk/content.php?categoryId=122

i'd like to see a full range of these to cover all the popular engines

god i sound like a salesman, they're nothing to do with me obviously, they look really good to me though

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Just a variation on rotary valves. They've been around forever.

99.9999% (guess) of (4-stroke) i.c. engines use poppet valves - there's probably a reason for that.

i've never come across them before

At Swansea uni they have a ford 302 running with twin rotary valve heads.

Having built similar engines for use in the Shell Eco-Marathon we ran into several problems, main one being that the rotating shaft takes lots of power to rotate due to having the combustion force acting upon it. Other problems included sealing, differing expansion to the head and concequent siezing/wearing and the costs involved in the precision manufacturing. Rotary valves are good in high flow, low pressure applications.