
Four Stroke Petrol Engine. Image credit petrolheadkenya.com
ZIMSEC O Level Combined Science Notes: The Petrol engine
- Four strokes are involved in the operation of most petrol engines
 - They are thus known as four-stroke engines
 - The first stroke is known as the inlet stroke
 - During the inlet stroke the piston moves downwards
 - Drawing in air and petrol vapor from the carburetor through the open inlet valve
 - The compression stroke
 - During this stroke the piston moves upwards and the all the valves are closed
 - This compresses the air and petrol mixture
 - The power stroke comes next
 - During this phase the gas is ignited by a spark plug
 - The gas mixture explodes giving off a lot of heat energy
 - This causes a large rise in pressure in the cylinder and the piston is forced downwards
 - The last stroke is known as the exhaust stroke
 - The piston rises and the exhaust valve opens
 - The exhaust gas is pushed out of the cylinder
 - The piston is kept moving between power strokes by the flywheel
 - A flywheel is a heavy revolving wheel that machine which is used to increase the machine’s momentum
 - and they provide greater stability or reserve of available power in an engine
 - The crankshaft connects the movement of the pistons to the driving shaft through a system of gears
 - There are at least four cylinders in a motor car
 - During every half-revolution of the crankshaft the cylinders “fire” in turn
 - This results in a much smoother running operation and evens out the distribution of power
 - Lubrication of the engine results in higher speed in the pistons
 - Oil is ed under pressure into the moving parts
 
To access more topics go to the Combined Science Notes page.