Otto engine

The Otto engine was a large stationary single-cylinder internal combustion

four-stroke engine designed by Nikolaus Otto. It was a low-RPM machine,
and only fired every other stroke due to the Otto cycle, also designed by
Otto.

Three types of internal combustion engines were designed by German

inventors Nikolaus Otto and his partner Eugen Langen. The models were a
failed 1862 compression engine, an 1864 atmospheric engine, and the
1876 Otto cycle engine known today as the "Gasoline Engine." The
engines were initially used for stationary installations, as Otto had no
interest in transportation. Other makers such as Daimler perfected the
Otto engine for transportation use.
Nikolaus August Otto as a young man was a traveling salesman for a
grocery concern. In his travels he encountered the internal combustion
engine built in Paris by Belgian expatriate Jean Joseph Etienne Lenoir. In
1860 Lenoir succeeded in creating a double-acting engine which ran on
illuminating gas at 4% efficiency. The 18 liter Lenoir engine was able to
produce only 2 horsepower.

In testing a replica of the Lenoir engine in 1861 Otto became aware of the
effects of compression on the fuel charge. In 1862 Otto attempted to
produce an engine to improve on the poor efficiency and reliability of the
Lenoir engine. He tried to create an engine which would compress the fuel
mixture prior to ignition, but failed, as that engine would run no more than
a few minutes prior to its destruction. Many engineers were also trying to
solve the problem with no success.

In 1864 Otto and Eugen Langen founded the first internal combustion
engine production company NA Otto and Cie (NA Otto and Company). Otto
and Cie succeeded in creating a successful atmospheric engine that same
year.

The factory ran out of space and was moved to the town of Deutz,
Germany in 1869 where the company was renamed to Gasmotoren-Fabrik
Deutz (The Gas Engine Manufacturing Company Deutz).

Gottlieb Daimler was technical director and Wilhelm Maybach was the
head of engine design. Daimler was a gunsmith who had also worked on
the Lenoir engine previously.

The Otto/Langen Atmospheric Engine of 1867.

By 1876 Otto and Langen succeeded in creating the first internal
combustion engine that compressed the fuel mixture prior to combustion
for far higher efficiency than any engine created to this time.
The first version of the atmospheric engine used a fluted column design
which was the design of Eugen Langen. The atmospheric engine has its
power stroke delivered upward using a rack and pinion to convert the
piston's linear motion to rotary motion. The expansion ratio of this engine
was much more effective than that of the 1860 Lenoir engine and gave the
engine its superior efficiency.

The Lenoir engine was an engine that burned fuel without first trying to
compress the fuel/mixture. The Otto/Langen atmospheric engine ran at
12% efficiency and produced .5 hp (0.37 kW; 0.51 PS) at 80 RPM. In
competition at the 1867 World's Fair in Paris, it easily bested the efficiency
of the Lenoir engine and won the Gold Medal, thus paving the way for
production and sales which funded additional research.

The first version used a frame

dispensed with as the design was
the fluted cylinder as well. The
ignition system and was made in
2.24 kW; 0.25 to 3.04 PS).

to stabilize the rack. This was soon

simplified. Later engines dispensed with
atmospheric engine used a gas flame
output sizes from 0.25 to 3 hp (0.19 to

When in 1872 N.A. Otto & Cie reorganized as Gasmotoren-Fabrik Deutz,

management picked Daimler as factory manager, bypassing even Otto,

and Daimler joined the company in August, taking Maybach with him as
chief designer.[6] While Daimler managed to improve production, the
weakness in the Otto's vertical piston design, coupled to Daimler's
stubborn insistence on atmospheric engines, led the company to an
impasse.

For all its commercial success, with the company producing 634 engines a
year by 1875, the Otto and Langen engine had hit a technical dead end: it
produced only 3 hp (2.2 kW; 3.0 PS), yet required 1013 ft (3.04.0 m)
headroom to operate.[7] In 1882, after producing 2,649 engines, the
atmospheric engine production was discontinued. This was also the year
that Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach left the company.