One of my technicians races those 1/8 scale cars with a tiny engine.
He also custom makes the components with the CNC mill in our shop. I
was looking at one of the engines on his bench and noticed there is no
spark plug and realized it worked like a diesel. He tells me it burns
a combination of Castor oil, kerosene and nitromethane. It does have a
carburator. It is air cooled and puts out 3 hp and fits in the palm of
my hand.
Could the same technology be used to make ultra-lightweight diesels for
outboards? Of course you'd want real fuel injection so you didnt have
to use the nitromethane (fuel atomization I assume). The cylinder
would have a high strength sleeve insert that could be easily replaced
but the rest would be made of Aluminum.

I suspect that mini engine has a glow plug that ignites the fuel. I
don't beleave I've ever heard of diesel operation without fuel
injection, you just couldn't control the point at which the fuel begins
to burn during the compression stroke. Be leary of light weight
diesels, the internal pressures that a diesel has to deal with are much
higher than that of gas engines. That's why industrial diesel engines,
like generators on boats, tend to last so long.

"Capt John" wrote in message
oups.com...
I suspect that mini engine has a glow plug that ignites the fuel. I
don't beleave I've ever heard of diesel operation without fuel
injection, you just couldn't control the point at which the fuel begins
to burn during the compression stroke. Be leary of light weight
diesels, the internal pressures that a diesel has to deal with are much
higher than that of gas engines. That's why industrial diesel engines,
like generators on boats, tend to last so long.


I have a small diesel airplane engine. No glow plug 2 stroke. You adjust
the compression with a thumbscrew on the top of the head. About 0.49 cc.