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Author Topic: Listeroid Ballence mis understood  (Read 16161 times)

listerjohn

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Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« on: April 15, 2006, 06:18:23 AM »
Well I am going to probably show just how bad a typist and speller I am but that is ok  ???
I challenge any one that thinks his listeroid is out of balance to run it up and flip the shut down lever and open the decomp lever and let the whole thing coast down.

The hopping and the dancing goes away.   Does it not?   I am going to bet I have a few people's attention

If you have balance vibration from the fly wheels or piston rod balancing  it will show up in coast down mode.

What most are describing is an inertia problem ( the piston and rod which have considerable mass are accelerated quickly by the expansion of cylinder gasses.)   The problem being it does not want to accelerate and due to inertia sticks in space thus lifting the engine assembly. ( the force needed to accelerate the piston assembly  rod , piston. crank, flywheel  slightly exceeds the weight of the engine. )   

There is two forces that create engine vibration   Primary   the change of direction of the piston mass ( counter acted by the bob weights on the crank shaft.  This is different from the inertia  stated above.  It is not a major problem here.

Secondary  The force of the weight of the big end of the con rod as it shifts on a horizontal plain (problem )  Causes the engine to dance in a forward direction 
more later
www.power-co.net

listerjohn

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #1 on: April 15, 2006, 06:25:49 AM »
The whorst of all engine is the mini petter It is a great engine if it is bolted to 400lbs of somthing
It needs a aluminum piston badly to help with the inertia problem

An object at rest wants to stay at rest
An object in motion wants to stay in motion

that piston does not want to excelorat 

Geno

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #2 on: April 15, 2006, 12:36:07 PM »
At this point I,ve only run mine for a few minutes (still building it) but I've noticed the same thing. It did'nt strike a chord till I read your post. Last night I put the frame on rubber pads and it shimmied forward as you state with no load and smoothed out on shutdown with the decomp lever engaged. I've been thinking about balance quite a bit and want mine smooth. Perhaps it really is an inertia issue but I still want it to run smooth. When I get there I'll probobly put a 2kw or so load on it and use Mr. Xs method of balance and hope for the best. I'd rather not tear apart an existing shed to pour concrete.

Jim Mc

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #3 on: April 15, 2006, 01:46:01 PM »
...the piston and rod which have considerable mass are accelerated quickly by the expansion of cylinder gasses.)   ...

Excellent point.  To make matters worse, just prior to the acceleration from the expansion stroke, they are decelerated by the energy that's needed to complete the 18:1 compression stroke.

Mr X

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #4 on: April 15, 2006, 04:21:09 PM »
For what ever reason your roid leaps and hops around has been analised and examined again and again on this forum. By some of the greatest minds I was  advised to bolt it down regardless of the bounce. When with a few hr simple work u can stop the hop. I gave my method to lessen the leap. Try it youll like it.

Greg
6/1 PS Jkson soon to run WVO,  3 hp Petter, 3 Honda 5 hp, 1 weed eater, Live off grid, Now a dog farmer

sid

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #5 on: April 16, 2006, 12:38:20 AM »
I am able to run my mini petter on a simple cart with 4 rubber tires// you can see a picture of it in the coppermine photos// today at an engine show it ran 6 hrs and never moved the cart// still in the same place it was when i started// I also have a 6 hp mp that will do the same thing// but i also have anothe 3.5 mp that I would not run in the middle of a corn field////sid
15 hp fairbanks morris1932/1923 meadows mill
8 hp stover 1923
8 hp lg lister
1932 c.s bell hammer mill
4 hp witte 1917
5 hp des jardin 1926
3 hp mini petters
2hp hercules 1924
1 1/2 briggs.etc

listeroidsusa

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #6 on: April 16, 2006, 02:07:09 AM »
BTW, the mini-petters I sold Sid DO have the aluminum pistons and they run quite smoothly. Many dealers and enthusiasts have been advocating cast iron pistons for the Lister and the Petter engines. If cast iron pistons are so great why doesn't your car and truck have them? Simply because time has proven the aluminum pistons to be superior. This applies to reciprocating weight, strength, and thermal expansion characteristics. Even the R.A. Lister Company changed to aluminum pistons for the higher speeds of the 8/1 and the 16/2. Only the 6/1 and 12/2 used cast iron pistons. Guy, what is your take on this?

listerjohn

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #7 on: April 16, 2006, 02:20:14 AM »
you are right on the weight issue.
 alum cools better
cast is still a better bearing metal however al has proven to work well
 the only problem is thermal loading and expansion.

al swells at twice twice the amount of cast iron so alounces must be made
al has a lower melting point, not too much of a problem in our application

john

yes you can add weight to the fly wheels and creat an out of ballence that counters the inerita  problem

sid

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #8 on: April 16, 2006, 02:31:14 AM »
you are correct mike// the petters I got from you along with th 8 hp lister are some of the best and somoothes engine I have/ also the most troublle free/ all 3 of them will run on a trailer///sid
15 hp fairbanks morris1932/1923 meadows mill
8 hp stover 1923
8 hp lg lister
1932 c.s bell hammer mill
4 hp witte 1917
5 hp des jardin 1926
3 hp mini petters
2hp hercules 1924
1 1/2 briggs.etc

cujet

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #9 on: April 16, 2006, 02:41:43 AM »
What you are noticing is the impossibility of balancing out combustion forces in a 4 stroke engine. It is true that some engines will smooth out when combustion is stopped. However that does not mean the balance issue is misunderstood. The primary balance of the engine still needs to be correct, or as good as possible with a Lister. Certainly, there is room for improvement on some engines.

I balanced an twin for Bruce on this forum. We ran it today and so far so good. Is it smooth (no) but is it a hopper, nope.

I also installed a lighter connecting rod in a single. It changed the engine from a hopper to a much smoother running engine.

By the way, the single now shakes worse on shutdown.

Chris
People who count on their fingers should maintain a discreet silence

listeroidsusa

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #10 on: April 16, 2006, 03:12:06 AM »
I've often thought of machining a rod from 7075 aluminum billet. I think the weight could probably be shaved substantially and still be plenty strong. The original Lister rod has a larger cross section than my D8 cat! It would be interesting to try but unfortunately I have too many irons in the fire now. Maybe later.

Mike

listerjohn

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #11 on: April 16, 2006, 03:51:33 AM »
What you are noticing is the impossibility of balancing out combustion forces in a 4 stroke engine. It is true that some engines will smooth out when combustion is stopped. However that does not mean the balance issue is misunderstood. The primary balance of the engine still needs to be correct, or as good as possible with a Lister. Certainly, there is room for improvement on some engines.
Yess you are right

a 2 cylinder  180 motors  do a very good job of canceling its inertia vibration as wellas canceling primary vibration

listerjohn

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #12 on: April 16, 2006, 03:57:13 AM »
mike what make do you sell?

www.power-co.net  My mail is on site

I would like to see

GuyFawkes

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #13 on: April 16, 2006, 12:52:19 PM »
BTW, the mini-petters I sold Sid DO have the aluminum pistons and they run quite smoothly. Many dealers and enthusiasts have been advocating cast iron pistons for the Lister and the Petter engines. If cast iron pistons are so great why doesn't your car and truck have them? Simply because time has proven the aluminum pistons to be superior. This applies to reciprocating weight, strength, and thermal expansion characteristics. Even the R.A. Lister Company changed to aluminum pistons for the higher speeds of the 8/1 and the 16/2. Only the 6/1 and 12/2 used cast iron pistons. Guy, what is your take on this?

weight of reciprocating components or non reciprocating components isn't really an issue by and of itself.

for example, BSA A10 650 cc parallel twin was an alloy engine with an iron head, later models went for an alloy head, it wasn't to save weight.

as far as the listers go whether the engine weighs 600 or 700 or 800 lbs doesn't really make any difference to a static engine

yes different applications like avaition diesels weight matters, but not to us.

balance is also not really related to weight, look at locomotive turntables, they could weigh 2 or 3 hundred tons all up, and yet one man could still easily crank them around.

so

1/ weight isn't an issue.
2/ strength isn't an issue (provided you have enough)

what other factors are there? particularly alloy vs cast iron.

cast iron vs cast alloy there are similar costs, spun or billet alloy is different costs.

machining alloy is cheaper and faster than machining cast iron

in some applcations alloy will conduct heat better than cast iron, and that can be important.

however, we are talking about a piston in an internal combustion engine, so we are most interested in a different property of metals.

their ability to absorb free electrons, the greater this ability, the more they inhibit or slow combustion.

BSA went with the alloy head and that allowed them to raise the compression ratio.

Lister put an alloy piston in the faster revving singles, because the duration of the ignition event was shorter at higher RPM and the heat of compression was greater yet the fuel was the same, so the alloy piston slowed the flame propogation.

an alloy piston will absorb more free electrons at cranking too, and make starting that much harder for any given compression ratio / head design / fuel type / fuel metering - timing setup

so

Fact 1

Choice of combustion chamber components materials has more to do with absorbtion of free electrons than anything else (provided of course other qualities are satisfied such as strength etc)

Fact 2

Lister managed to build these engines*** for fifty years and balance them properly at the factory.

*** 650 rpm 6/1- we _must_ exclude 8/1, and clone 12/1 etc, they are NOT the same animal

Fact 3

The Lister 6/1 was multifuel, the 8/1 wasn't. (or was, but far more limited) so an alloy piston in a 6/1 will screw this up too...

Fact 4

The lister had chromed bores, they weren't exposed during TDC but they were during compression and combustion, and this alters flame speed a little too.... from the MECHANICAL viewpoint chromed rings in plain bores is just as good, many a 2 stroke with chrome bores can be economically rebuilt with chrome rings and a rebore, but you ALWAYS have to adjust the timing and jets ever so slightly afterwards... the Cagiva / harley 2 strokes were a classic example.

Fact 4

A listeroid is not a lister.

Speaking personally here I think we have two camps, those of us like me who have a genuine lister and have never seen a listeroid, and those of us who have a listeroid and have never seen a lister. I believe there are a few who have seen both, but they are not to the best of my knowledge mechanical engineers.

---------------------------------

An observation.

I've read your comments, you have CNC and so on so you are clearly a mechanical engineer, and it appears to me you are setting yourself the task of trying to reverse engineer a genuine lister without actually seeing one, in much the same way people do to avoid patent and intellectual property violations, in short, you are hobbling yourself significantly, for no real patent or IP purpose.

My advice to you would be grab a flight or buy your own genuine Lister, then you have a baseline, then you can draw up a table of differences (___LOT___ cheaper than an new CNC that you might not need) because at the end of the day Lister did it right, so right they could not (__NOT__ did not or not bothered to) significantly improve on the design of the 6/1 for fifty bloody years.

I cannot tell you the precise weight or centre of mass or dimensions at 15 degrees celcuis of a genuine Lister 6/1 piston, (the only one I own is still inside a working motor) and I certainly cannot tell you an accurate materials composition of it.

Until and unless you have that data, you are trying to re-invent the wheel, having only seen a cheap copy that someone else with different priorities and agendas to both Mr Lister and yourself knocked off, which may not be the same as the next batch they knock off.

You need a genuine running Lister 6/1 to strip and play with, and a non runner to pull apart for materials analysis so you know what grade to cast iron to pour for each component. see my successful weld of frost damage on a Lister cast iron barrel with a bog standard steel mig wire... my hunch was right, Lister cast iron was towards the malleable end of the scale, my hunch says listeroid case will be nearer the other end of the scale, because it will be poured from generic scrap.

You almost certainly have a Bridgeport or Cincinatti there is you have any CNC, so make a coffee and go and look at the cast iron on them, don't look at a knee mill or whatever the machine is, look at the material, then look at your listeroid, not as a listeroid, but as material.

One final comment before you go and try and knock up an alloy piston.

20 bucks says the genuine lister cast iron piston is cast and turned on a lathe to be round.

You going to make that same bet that an alloy piston of those dimensions is round and not oval over the gudgeon / wrist pin structure at room temp? coefficients of thermal expansion are different on alloy too.

So bottom line here is if you paid me a thousand bucks as a consultant on this problem my advice would be drop everything until you have looked in depth at genuine lister and established a bet-your-life-on-it baseline to work from.

I have a genuine start-o-matic you're welcome to come over and strip and rebuild and measure and document as much as you like, genuine offer.

--
Original Lister CS 6/1 Start-o-matic 2.5 Kw (radiator conversion)
3Kw 130 VDC Dynamo to be added. (compressor + hyd pump)
Original Lister D, megasquirt multifuel project, compressor and truck alternator.
Current status - project / standby, Fuel, good old pump diesel.

listeroidsusa

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Re: Listeroid Ballence mis understood
« Reply #14 on: April 16, 2006, 01:36:29 PM »
I'm not really trying to reinvent the wheel here, my purpose is primarily experimenting with a number of items to get these engines EPA compliant. I personally like the original design, but unfortunately it will require modification in order to become compliant. Better to have a "close" copy than no copy at all. That is where we are heading in the US. I noticed the other day that even some of the lawn mowers now have computers, fuel injection, oxygen sensors, and catalytic converters. This is what the government is forcing upon us here. At the best I'll extend the availability only a couple of years or so, and then it will be practically impossible to meet specs with a diesel since the EPA standards in a couple of years make no distinction between petrol and diesel engines. They will both have to meet similar standards. So, I'd be quite happy with either the listeroid OR the Lister as they are now, but that is no longer possible here in the US. The supply of English Lister engines will dry up shortly and then there will be NO choice whatsoever. A friend of mine has a container of Listers waiting in England. When he gets them here I'll go through them and then I'll see for myself the differences.

Mike