The Waissi Engine is of an opposed-piston design, much like that being developed by Achates Power or EcoMotors, with one important difference: Waissi’s engine has fewer parts. The idea behind Waissi’s design is weight and mass reduction. Mass in motion that isn’t directly tied with power transmission actually wastes energy. As the internal combustion engine hasn’t even tapped 50% efficiency, serious innovation is needed to improve fuel economy.
Many engineers have improved engine efficiency by weight reduction measures, including aluminum engine blocks, cylinder heads, pistons and even connecting rods [connecting the piston to the crankshaft]. The Waissi Engine has gone one step further, eliminating the connecting rods and redesigning the crankshaft. The opposed pistons are connected to each other, which keeps them in time, while the bottoms of the pistons rest on a crankdisk, essentially a large diameter camshaft.
The pistons in the basic two-cylinder Waissi Engine push on the crankdisk, forcing it to turn. Combining two modules of two cylinders each, performance and smoothness is improved. There is less mass in angular motion, which reduces the energy required to constantly accelerate and decelerate it.
As I’m looking at the Waissi Engine, I think my one concern is what I guess we’d have to call crank lash, the miniscule variation between the size of the crankdisk and the pistons. Perhaps something in that hard connection. I understand the reduction of mass by eliminating the connecting rods, but what of the mass added to connect the pistons to each other? Still, very interesting work being done at ASU. The internal combustion engine is not dead [yet].
