US3745981A

US3745981A - Internal combustion rotor engine

Info

Publication number: US3745981A
Application number: US00068857A
Authority: US
Inventors: H Warner
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1970-09-02
Filing date: 1970-09-02
Publication date: 1973-07-17
Anticipated expiration: 1990-07-17

Abstract

A rotor engine, which comprises fourfold working pistons. The pistons forming jointly with a cylinder two ring-shaped compression chambers in the center section of the cylinder. The cylinder defines in one of its sections two combustion chambers. The pistons, being on a power stroke every time, the piston moves one side of the cylinder to the other side. The cylinder has a cylinder head including ports to pilot the intake to an exhaust from the engine by the pistons, compression pipes are also provided and passage means are arranged for a fuel-air mixture from the compression chamber through compression pipes to the top of valves in the cylinder heads. A rotor assembly comprises a left rotor and a right rotor. The rotors have cam-like tracks. At least one cylindrical runner assembly including at least one runner and are placed between the cam-like tracks of the rotors. The rotors include two cylindrical castings on a rotor shaft, such that they are facing each other, yet 90* off set from each other, so that a high lobe of one of the rotors is opposite a low lobe of the other of the rotors, and being in constant contact with the cam-like tracks. A roller pin connects the runners and transmits the power stroke of the engine from the pistons to the runner, and the number of power strokes are available through the use of one cylinder and piston-assembly dependent upon the number of the lobes.

Description

United States Patent Warner [111 3,745,981 [451 July 17,1973

[ INTERNAL COMBUSTION ROTOR ENGINE {76] Inventor: Henry Warner, 164-71 Underhill Avenue, Flushing, NY.

22 Filed: Sept. 2, 1970 [21] Appl. No.: 68,857

[52] US. Cl. 123/58 AB, 92/71, 123/56 BC [51] Int. Cl. F02b 75/26 [58] Field of Search 123/62, 58 AB, 56 BC, 123/71 V, 71 R; 92/71 [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,094,398 4/1914 Anderson 123/62 1,127,267 2/1915 McElwain.... 92/71 X 1,215,383 2/1917 Kenyon 123/62 1,436,130 11/1922 Webb 123/71 V X 2,538,726 1/1951 Kane et a1. 123/62 X 2,856,781 10/1958 Forbes 123/58 AB X Primary Examiner-Wendell E. Burns Attorney-Ernest G. Montague [57] ABSTRACT A rotor engine, which comprises fourfold working pistons. The pistons forming jointly with a cylinder two ring-shaped compression chambers in the center section of the cylinder. The cylinder defines in one of its sections two combustion chambers. The pistons, being on a power stroke every time, the piston moves one side of the cylinder to the other side. The cylinder has a cylinder head including ports to pilot the intake to an exhaust from the engine by the pistons, compression pipes are also provided and passage means are arranged for a fuel-air mixture from the compression chamber through compression pipes to the top of valves in the cylinder heads. A rotor assembly comprises a left rotor and a right rotor. The rotors have cam-like tracks. At least one cylindrical runner assem bly including at least one runner and are placed between the cam-like tracks of the rotors. The rotors include two cylindrical castings on a rotor shaft, such that they are facing each other, yet 90 off set from each other, so that a high lobe of one of the rotors is opposite a low lobe of the other of the rotors, and being in constant contact with the cam-like tracks. A roller pin connects the runners and transmits the power stroke of the engine from the pistons to the runner, and the number of power strokes are available through the use of one cylinder and piston-assembly dependent upon the number of the lobes.

2 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures "Q 1 9 a r I la 3 l g g 4 1 :2

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sum 1 052 INTERNAL COMBUSTION ROTOR ENGINE The present invention relates to a rotor engine with four-fold working piston.

It is one object of the present invention to provide an internal combustion powerplant that compared to present designed powerplants is smaller in size, simpler in design and operation, has less moving parts, has less power loss due to lack of non power producing strokes and movements, and has a high degree of versatility.

According to the present invention, the rotor engines advantages reside in the fact, that there are four power strokes for each revolution of a rotor shaft, and that the power output can be increased in various ways. One way is to place a second cylinder and piston assembly around the rotor axis, 135 off from the first cylinder and piston assembly. In this manner there will be an overlapping of power strokes. This will provide the engine with eight power strokes for one shaft revolution. This is equivalent to two, eight cylinder, four cycle engines. Another way to increase the power of the rotor engine is by increasing the number of strokes per shaft revolution. This is accomplished by increasing the diameter of the rotors, and increasing the number of high lobes and low points on each rotor to four. By using one cylinder and piston assembly, and using a rotor with four high lobes, once again there are eight power strokes for one shaft revolution. A third way to increase the power output is to use a combination of the two above mentioned methods. By combining two cylinder and piston assemblies with rotors that have four high lobes, the engine will have 16 power strokes per shaft revolution, which would equal four, eight cylinder, four cycle engines. Theoretically more power can still be obtained by increasing the rotor diameter even further and increasing the number of high lobes by even numbers, however there exists a practical limit due to size and application.

Another advantage of the engine designed in accordance with the present invention is that since this engine will have either a minimum of two combustion chambers or a maximum of four, the hook up for a clean burning computerized injection system will not be very uncomplicated. Yet another advantage to the present engine is the factthat the rotor engine can also be driven by compressed air or steam by removing the cylinder andpiston assembly and reworking the piston that forms the ring shaped compression chamber, and stearing the inlet and outlet by means of a sliding valve.

With this and other objects in view which will become apparent in the following detailed description, the present invention will be clearly understood in connection with the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a partial view of the rotor assembly of the rotor engine, and a sectional view of the cylinder and piston assembly of the rotor engine.

FIG. 2 is a cross sectional end view of the rotor assembly of the rotor engine, and a partial end view of the cylinder and piston assembly of the rotor engine.

FIG. 3 is an extended schematic view of the cam-like tracks of the rotors.

Referring now to the drawings, the rotor engine consists of three major assemblies. These assemblies are a rotor assembly, a cylinderand piston assembly and a runner assembly.

1. The rotor assembly consists of two cylindrically shaped castings, each of which has a cam like track machined into one of its ends. This cam like track forms two high lobes and two low points on each rotor. These two rotors are then mounted onto a rotor shaft 11 so that the two cam like tracks face eachother but are degrees spaced apart eachother, so that the high lobe of one rotor is opposite the low point of the other rotor. They are spaced far enough apart on their shaft 11 so that the runner assembly will be able to fit between them. This is the main assembly of the rotor engine.

2. The cylinder and piston assembly is the power producing section of the rotor engine. It consists of two subassemblies which are designed as follows:

A cylinder assembly comprises a three piece machined casting. The center section of the cylinder assembly has a boring going through its length that is of a greater diameter than the borings of either the left or the right section. Both the left and the right sections are capped with cylinder heads, that have mounted in them a self-piloted intake valve and around the valve opening shaft a compression chamber for cooling the valve opening and cylinder head and around the valve shaft round openings. For scavenging for good cleaning of the combustion chamber and spark plug. The center section forms the two compression chambers 3 and 4, while the left and the right sections form the two combustion chambers 1 and 2.

The piston assembly 6 is a one piece machined casting which for ease of explanation will be referred to as consisting of three parts. The center section is a cylindrically shaped casting that has compression ring grooves cut into it at each end. The diameter of the piston 6 is such that it has freedom of movement in the center section of the cylinder assembly 5. It makes a tight seal with the cylinder wall through the use of compression rings. The length of the piston 6 is slightly less than the length of the center section of the cylinder assembly 5 minus the stroke of the piston assembly 6. The left and the right sections of the piston assembly 6 are of such a diameter that there is freedom of movement between them and the cylinder wall, and they are sealed through the use of compression rings. The length of these sections is slightly less that the length of either the left or right sections of the cylinder assembly 5. The left and the right sections of the piston assembly 6 have grooves for compression rings cut into their outer ends.

' When the piston assembly6 is mounted in the cylinder assembly 5, the entire unit forms two ring shaped, ring sealed compression chambers 3 and 4,

and two ring sealed combustion chambers l and 2.

3. The runner assembly consists of the runner 7 which is a cylindrically shaped machined casting and a runner guide which is a casting 8 that has a boring throughout its length large enough to allow a runner 7 smooth freedom of movement in and out of the guide. At both ends of the runner 7 are mounted ball bearings whose axis are perpendicular to the runner's 7 travel and parallel to each other. The runner assembly 7 is mounted between the rotor assembly 6 and the cylinder and piston assembly 6 in such a way that the bearings of the runner 7 are in constant contact with the camlike track of the rotors 10 of the rotor assembly. The runner 7 is coupled to the center piston 6 of the cylinder 5 and piston assembly 6 through a roller pin 9 that fits through a slot that is machined into therunner guide 7 and a matching slot that is machined into the center section of the cylinder assembly 5 which slot is arranged through the runner 7 and the piston 6.

In order to simplify the explanation of the operation of the rotor engine of the present invention the cycle with the left combustion chamber 1 under compression just before the point of ignition, and runner 7 over on the left side is taken up first, while the right end of the runner 7 is making contact with the right rotor just before the top of the lobe.

As the left spark plug fires, the left end of piston 6 in the cylinder 5 starts its stroke, taking the runner 7 in the runner assembly 8 with it through the roller pin 9. The runner 7 is now transmitting all the force of the combustion onto the declining slope of the lobe of the right rotor 10, which in turn rotates the rotor shaft 11. As the piston 6 continues traveling, the area in the right compression chamber 4 decreases forcing the fuel-air mixture out through the compression pipe 4 that connects the right compression chamber 4 to the top side of the intake valve 12 of the left combustion chamber 1. Around the valve guide are holes in the cylinder head for passage of the air-fuel mixture to the valve 12. The holes in the compression head give the mixture a motion for better cleaning. Since the piston 6 is still on the power stroke. The pressure in the left combustion chamber 1 is still greater than the pressure that is building up in the right compression chamber 4 and the compression pipe 4 of the left combustion chamber 1, and the self piloted valve 12 stays closed. As the power stroke of the left side of piston 6 continues, the fuel-air mixture that is present in the right compression chamber 4 is being compressed. At this time there is a vacuum being created in the left compression chamber 3 which will draw in the fuel-air mixture from the carburetor when the left end of the piston 6 is at the end of the power stroke which happens when the top of the left end of piston 6 passes the exhaust port 13, allowing the burned gases to escape. At this point, the left end side of the ring shaped center piston 6 passes the intake port 14, and draws the fuel-air mixture into the exising vacuum in the left compression chamber 3. At this point, the runner 7 is almost at the low end of right rotor 10, and approaching the high lobe of the left rotor 10. As the end of the left piston 6 opened the exhaust port 13, the pressure in the left combustion chamber 1 drops, allowing the greater pressure of the right compression chamber 4 to force left valve 12 open. Due to the high pressure of the incoming fuel-air mixture, its velocity helps to expel the exhaust gases, and purge the cylinder 5 of all burned gases. Now the right combustion chamber 2 is under compression, and the left combustion chamber 1 is full of a fresh fuel-air mixture. At a predetermined number of degrees of spark advance of the right end of piston 6, the right spark plug fires, and the right side of the piston 6 is now on its power stroke. The runner 7, which is connected through the roller pin 9 to the piston 6, now follows the piston 6 and transmits all the power of the power stroke onto the back slope of the left rotor 10. As the piston 6 continues to move through its power stroke, it compresses the fuel-air mixture in the left combustion chamber 1 and the left compression chamber 3. As the piston 6 reaches the end of its stroke, and passes the exhaust port 13, it allows the higher pressure in the left compression chamber 3 and the compression pipe 3 that connects the left compression chamber 3 and the top of the right intake valve 12 to force the right intake valve 12 open and expel all the burned gases, and charge the right combustion chamber 2 with new gases. As the right combustion chamber 2 is filled, there is no longer a higher pressure on the back of the right valve 12, and the valve springs pull right valve 12 shut. The runner 7 is now near the low point of the left rotor 10, and approaching the high lobe of the right rotor 10. The left combustion chamber 1 is now again under compression, and at the predetermined spark advance the left spark plug fires. This completes one-half revolution of the rotor shaft 1 l, and brings the piston 6 back to the starting point Having described my invention, I claim:

1. A rotor engine, comprising fourfold working pistons,

said pistons forming jointly with a cylinder two ringshaped compression chambers in the center section of said cylinder,

said cylinder defining in one of its sections two combustion chambers,

one of said pistons being on a power stroke every time the fourfold piston moves from one side of said cylinder to the other side,

said cylinder having a cylinder head including ports, to pilot the intake to said engine by said pistons,

compression pipes,

passage means from said compression chambers through compression pipes to the top of valves in said ports in said cylinder heads,

a rotor assembly comprising a left rotor and a right rotor,

said rotors having cam-like tracks,

at least one cylindrical runner assembly including at least one runner and placed between said cam-like tracks of said rotors,

said runners having bearing means at both ends,

said rotors including two cylindrical castings on a rotor shaft, such that they are facing each other, yet offset from each other, so that a high lobe of one of said cam-like tracks being opposite a low lobe of the other of said cam-like tracks, and being in constant contact with said runners,

a roller pin connecting said runner assembly and transmitting the power stroke of the engine from said pistons to said runners.

2. The rotor engine, as set forth in claim I, wherein said compression chambers are ring-shaped and have a greater volume than said combustion chambers, and said combustion chambers are adapted to be filled with fresh air.

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Claims

1. A rotor engine, comprising fourfold working pistons, said pistons forming jointly with a cylinder two ring-shaped compression chambers in the center section of said cylinder, said cylinder defining in one of its sections two combustion chambers, one of said pistons being on a power stroke every time the fourfold piston moves from one side of said cylinder to the other side, said cylinder having a cylinder head including ports, to pilot the intake to said engine by said pistons, compression pipes, passage means from said compression chambers through compression pipes to the top of valves in said ports in said cylinder heads, a rotor assembly comprising a left rotor and a right rotor, said rotors having cam-like tracks, at least one cylindrical runner assembly including at least one runner and placed between said cam-like tracks of said rotors, said runners having bearing means at both ends, said rotors including two cylindrical castings on a rotor shaft, such that they are facing each other, yet 90* offset from each other, so that a high lobe of one of said cam-like tracks being opposite a low lobe of the other of said cam-like tracks, and being in constant contact with said runners, a roller pin connecting said runner assembly and transmitting the power stroke of the engine from said pistons to said runners.

2. The rotor engine, as set forth in claim 1, wherein said compression chambers are ring-shaped and have a greater volume than said combustion chambers, and said combustion chambers are adapted to be filled with fresh air.