On Fri, 01 Jul 2005 15:51:13 -0400, RichA <none@none.com> wrote:
>On Thu, 30 Jun 2005 07:55:12 GMT, Henry <doREMOVEot2@earthlink.net>
>wrote:
>
>>On June 18 Blue Oval News announced that Ford settled the suits about
>>the plastic v-8 intake manifolds that crack and lose coolant. They will
>>pay owners about a third of a billion US$. You can find the article on
>>http://www.flamingfords.info
>
>At the time I said making plastic manifolds was a stupid idea.
>The look of them on Mustang engines sickened me.
>My concerns were dismissed by "knowledgible" people who extolled
>the virtues of plastic in engines. Plastics, first and formost
>are designed to CHEAPEN products, from car engines to cameras.
>They are NEVER used when critical applications are involved and for
>good reason. While there certainly ARE composites that can be used,
>they tend to be more costly than the metal alternatives, thus you
>rarely see them in mass-market applications. I hope this marks the
>END of such experiments by Ford.
>
Really, there is nothing wrong with using plastic for the intake
manifold. The plastic is easily capable of taking the heat from the
engine, and the thermal properties of plastic are more favorable than
metal. Which I suppose is the reason ford used them in the first
place.
If the manifolds crack, then really it's not so much of the plastics
fault, but more of just a simple structural design flaw. Todays
engineering software allows for some awesome simulation, allowing you
to create a 3D model of your components, put them together, and
simulate anything from physical stresses, thermal, gas / liquid flow
analysis, etc. I love playing w/ that stuff =) But, this software is
only so good, and it is extremely difficult to really predict what
forces truly occur, how, when, and where and set up the simulations
accordingly. On top of that, it's relatively easily to simulate X
amount of stress and see where things might break. But it's a lot
harder to simulate the effects of the same stress over time...So
despite all this technology, design flaws can, do, and will still
happen.
And, I hope this does not mark the end of experiments because
experiments, as much as they may suck if things go bad, are the only
way to advance. And remember, they people that design this are humans
too, just like everyone else, they make mistakes.
--
Stephan
2001 Yamaha YZF-R6 <--- Stolen