Guys,
Got sent this link describing Bruce Crower's 6 stroke engine
http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060224/FREE/60222004/1024Basically he adds a steam expansion and exhaust stroke AFTER the normal 4 stroke cycle.
The expanding steam removes the bulk of the heat from the cylinder and exhaust. Remember that in a diesel 1/3 of the fuel energy heats the block and 1/3 ends up in the exhaust.
He claims 40% fuel improvement in fuel consumption and incredibly cool running - all the waste heat ends up in the steamy exhaust.
Bruce Crower is no young upstart - he has been developing cams and engine technology since the late 1940s.
How could this work for us in a Listeroid? Well remove the idler gear and run the camshaft at 1/3rd engine rpm or alternatively put a timing pulley on the crankshaft and resort to an overhead camshaft run at 1/3rd engine rpm.
The beauty of the Listeroid is that you could squirt the steam into the engine via the compression change valve port.
Think, Induction, Compression, Power, Exhaust, Expansion, Exhaust - that's 6 by my count.
You could use the existing water jacket as a hot well, and take it up to about 95 C, then a monotube boiler coil around the exhaust to boil the water and an external monotube steam super heater. The existing cam-shaft could be used to drive a feed pump and the injector pump could be used to spray fuel oil into an external burner for the steam superheater.
He even suggests that you could skip the normal IC exhaust stroke and keep the exhaust valve closed - recompressing the exhaust gases, then admit the steam for the steam power stroke. A final exhaust stroke purges all the steam and exhaust and cleans the cylinder and exhaust of carbon and crap.
Any takers,
Ken