Who cares about what?
Who said that high RPMs are good for an engine?
Why do you keep replying to Whitey’s posts?
OK, you win! All V8’s outlive V6’s and all 4 cylinders are overworked - overreved- and die an early and ugly death. Now move on and find something else to get fired up about. How 'bout all pickups last longer than compact sedans?
Yep, EllyEllis, you win! I don’t haul or tow anything, and I am single with no children, but since you can’t possibly be wrong, I am going to buy myself a 1984 Cadillac El Dorado with a V8 HT-4100 engine. I am sure that will give me more miles than my 4 cylinder Honda Civic.
Do you know why EllyEllis stopped drinking tequila? Because drinking tequila used to make him obstinate.
Is that the same V8 I got in my '85 Caddy DeVille? It was a transverse mounted V8 and it was toast after about 75K properly maintained miles. Perhaps the worst motor ever made by GM. But as per EllyEllis it must have been my fault because it was a V8 and that means it would outlive all other lessor 6 and 4 cylinder mills.
UncleTurbo, you mean your V8 1985 Cadillac DeVille didn’t last as long as my I4 1985 Buick Skyhawk? That Skyhawk had more than 150,000 miles on it when I finally sold it, and it was still going strong. That CAN’T be right! I abused the heck out of that engine. Yours couldn’t have had twice as many cylinders and lasted half as long! That’s just not possible!
I think the Cadillac HT-4100 V8 was one of the worst engines of all time. It had an aluminum block and cast iron cylinder heads. It was known for its failed head gaskets. The “HT” was supposed to stand for “high tech.”
I don’t understand! It had 8 cylinders, so by EllyEllis’ standards, it must have been a very reliable and long lasting engine! This can’t be right!
UncleTurbo,
Did your engine fail due to the head gasket issue? Just curious.
This was many years ago. We bought the car new and took good care of it. No trailer, no major issues with repairs. It started making lots of ugly noises deep in the engine. I don’t remember that it ever overheated and it never left us stranded. The noises were diagnosed and I believe they said the crankshaft and or bearings were going out. Cadillac offered a new engine if we paid for the labor of installation. We said no, the motor was defective so why should we pay the labor. I don’t recall if it died completely, but eventually GM replaced the motor. We didn’t think the new motor would last that long either and we sold the car and got a used '87 Saab 900T with a 5 spd. About as far from a Deville as you can get.
GM had to replace many crankshafts, camshafts, and related hardware in this particular engine. It sounds like that is what happened to yours.
The V6 engine is inherently out of balance, because of placement and firing patterns of the cylinders. When two pistons on one bank of 3 are in the compression position, only ONE is left in the compression position in the opposite cylinder bank of 3 to counteract the weight shift of the TWO opposite pistons. An inline engine with an odd number of cylinders cannot balance itself because there is an odd man out. A V6 is in many ways two Inline3 engines connected to one crankshaft.
They use counterweights to minimize this event, but over time, the imbalance of the V6 will cause uneven wear and tear on a number of parts in the engine.
Although not perfectly balanced, an I4 engine naturally compensates for the piston movements, because there are an even number of pistons in the bank, thus, when two of the pistons are in compression position, the other two are in the opposite position, with no odd piston out as we have with the V6.
You may be correct for a 90 degree v6, but the 60 degree v6s I’ve driven are extremely smooth, much smoother than I4s.
A V6 is going to feel smoother than a I4 possibly because with six cylinders, you have the ability to fire the pistons in a more smoothed out manor. there are smoother movements of pistons through the “off” cylinders while combustion takes place in the two firing ones. (complete guess)
I feel like an I4 has more of a stop and go feel to it because there is no extraneous “smoothing” movement in “off cylinders”.
That was all hypothesis though so I may be talking out of my ass.
All I can say is that in its most basic form, an I4 is going to take a lot less abuse through its life because it has perfect primary balance.
There is some truth to that. With early I4s (back in the 1970s and 1980s), there was a lot of engine vibration. That is one reason early I4s were designed to operate within higher RPM ranges. Along with counterbalancing, shortening the interval between sparks made them smoother. Manufacturers of modern I4s have solved this problem, as have manufacturers of modern V6s.
The I6 is still popular for those who can afford them, but smoothness really isn’t the issue any more. It is more a matter of preference.
afi, I think what you said about 2 pistons being in the compression is entirely wrong. A 6 fires every 120 degrees and a 4 fires every 180 degrees. A V6 is smoother. Besides that every engine has counter weights to help balance the crtank shaft.
A 4 does have more “stop and go movement” because there is 60 degrees more between compression (firing) strokes. Also, they never shortened the interval between firing.
who cares what Whitey wants??? I keep replying to his posts because they are so far from reality. He even thinks that they have shortened the interval between sparks on a 4 cylinder engine!!!
I apologize, it was that one of the ‘up’ piston was in compression, the other “up” piston in the same bank was pushing exhaust, yet they would still have 2 ‘up’ in one bank and only 1 ‘up’ in the opposing bank. Hence the counterweights.
I’m still learning. This stuff is great though.
OK, but it seems to me that while 2 are up on one bank, 2 are at the bottom of the other bank, I don’t think this would unbalance the shaft. After all there is only one crankshaft. In a 4 you have 2 up and 2 down at the same time, surely that would be just as unbalanced. Anyway they both have counterweights.
[u]FOR THE THIRD TIME: Who said that high RPMs are good for an engine?[/u]
EllyEllis, didn’t you yourself say that a 4 cylinder engine operates at higher RPMs than a V6? If it operates at higher RPMs, that means the crank shaft is spinning faster, and that means that the time interval between sparks in each cylinder would be shorter, wouldn’t it?
Correct me if I am wrong, but when an engine operates at higher RPMs, doesn’t that shorten the time interval between sparks? This is an extremely elementary concept. Why don’t you get it? Why do you think this idea is so silly?
I care what Whitey wants. I care what you want too, especially if you politely ask me to treat you with respect. I don’t know you personally, but something tells me you don’t like being treated disrespectfully. Maybe you do, I don’t know. However, I think you are being rude, and you could stand to learn some manners.
If not for the counterweights, the ideal would be to have two opposing pistons mirror each other, which happens in the I4. I think the counterweights put this to rest.
My point was simply that the I4 still has superior balance than a counterweighted V6, has possibly 2 fewer camshafts, up to 4-6 fewer valves, 2 fewer plugs, etc
In my mind that would make it the winner of the longevity contest.