UNIT I – VEHICLE STRUCTURE

AND ENGINES
Dr.K.BALAMURUGAN
ASP/MECH,
IRTT, Erode
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UNIT I VEHICLE STRUCTURE AND

ENGINES
• Types of Automobiles - Vehicle Construction and different
layouts – Chassis – Frame and Body – resistances to
vehicle motion-need for a gear box - Components of
Engine – Their forms, Functions and Materials.
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Automobile
• An automobile, autocar, motor car or car is a
wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers,
which also carries its own engine or motor.
• Most definitions of the term specify that automobiles are
designed to run primarily on roads, to have seating for
one to six people, typically have four wheels and be
constructed principally for the transport of people rather
than goods.
• In 2010 that the number of automobiles had risen to over
1 billion vehicles, with 500 million reached in 1986. The
numbers are increasing rapidly, especially
in China and India.
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History of Automobile
• Karl Benz, the inventor of the modern automobile
• Bertha Benz, the first long distance automobile driver in
the world
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History of Automobile
• A photograph of the original Benz Patent-Motorwagen,
first built in 1885 and awarded the patent for the concept
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History of Automobile
• Portrait of Henry Ford (ca. 1919)
• Ford Model T, 1927, regarded as the first affordable
American automobile
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Types of Automobile - General

1. Privately owned for transporting the owner and his or

her passengers
2. Alternative fuel vehicle
3. Armored car
4. Battery vehicle (electric car)
5. Police car
6. Solar vehicle
7. Taxicab
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Types of Automobile - By propulsion system

• Propulsion 8. Alternative fuel vehicle

technologies 9. Autogas
1. Internal combustion 10. Biodiesel, Common
engine ethanol fuel mixtures
2. Electric vehicle 11. Gasoline Direct
3. Hybrid vehicle Injection
4. Hydrogen vehicle 12. Homogeneous Charge
Compression Ignition
5. Fuel cell
13. Liquid Nitrogen
6. Steam car
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Types of Automobile - By engine type

1. Flat engine 7. Single cylinder
2. Flathead engine engine
3. Four-stroke engine 8. Straight engine
4. H engine 9. Straight-six engine
5. Pushrod engine 10. Two-stroke engine
6. Reciprocating 11. V engine
engine 12. W engine
13. Wankel engine
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Types of Automobile
• By engine fuel type • By engine positioning
1. Diesel engine 1. Front-engine
2. Electric car 2. Rear-engine
3. Gasoline engine 3. Mid-engine
4. Hybrid vehicle • By drive type
5. Hydrogen vehicle • Two-wheel drive
6. Steam car • Four-wheel drive
• Front-wheel drive
• Rear-wheel drive
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Types of Automobile
• By layout
• Front-engine, front-wheel drive
• Rear-engine, front-wheel drive layout
• Front-engine, rear-wheel drive
• Front mid-engine, rear-wheel drive
• Rear mid-engine, rear-wheel drive
• Mid-engine, front-wheel drive
• Rear-engine, rear-wheel drive
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Types of Automobile - Transmission

1. Conventional Gears
• In which ordinary gear beam is fitted
2. Semi automatic gears
• In which combination of manual plus some automatic machines is
there.
3. Fully automatic
• In which vehicles are fully equipped with full automatic transmission
system by using epicyclic gears and torque convertors.
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Types of Automobile - Wheels

• 1. Two wheelers - Scooters, motor cycles.

• 2. Three wheelers - Auto richshaws.
• 3. Four wheelers - Cars, jeeps.
• 4. Six wheelers and above in buses.
• 5. Truckes trailors.
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Types of Automobile – Body style

1. Closed car like, saloons, couple etc.
2. Open cars like, sport cars, convertible cars.,
3. Special style vehicle like, estate car, station wagon etc.

• 1. Light vehicle Bodies - cars, jeeps

• 2. Heavy vehicle Bodies – Busses, Lorries
• 3. Medium vehicle Bodies -Vans, Metadoors
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Vehicle construction - Chassis

• A chassis consists of an internal framework that supports
a man-made object in its construction and use.
• It is analogous to an animal's skeleton.
• An example of a chassis is the underpart of a motor
vehicle, consisting of the frame (on which the body is
mounted) with the wheels and machinery.

• In the case of vehicles, the term chassis means

the frame plus the "running gear”
like engine, transmission, driveshaft, differential,
and suspension.
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Chassis
• Chassis is a French term and was initially used to denote
the frame parts or Basic Structure of the vehicle.
• It is the back bone of the vehicle. A vehicle with out body
is called Chassis.
• The components of the vehicle like Power plant,
Transmission System, Axles, Wheels and Tires,
Suspension, Controlling Systems like Braking, Steering
etc., and also electrical system parts are mounted on the
Chassis frame.
• It is the main mounting for all the components including
the body. So it is also called as Carrying Unit.
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Layout of Chassis and its main

Components
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Layout of Chassis and its main

Components
• 1. Frame: it is made up of long two members called side
members riveted together with the help of number of cross
members.
• 2. Engine or Power plant: It provides the source of power
• 3. Clutch: It connects and disconnects the power from the
engine fly wheel to the transmission system.
• 4. Gear Box
• 5. U Joint
• 6. Propeller Shaft
• 7. Differential
• 8. Dumb iron : a curved side piece of a vehicle chassis, to
which the front springs are attached.
• 9. Shackle : A spring shackle is a device found on leaf-spring
equipped vehicles.
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Requirements of chassis
• Support the weight of the vehicle (except the unspring
mass) and everything inside it including passengers and
cargo.
• Provide the frame for the suspension, engine and
drivetrain to be mounted. It must be strong to hold these
components in place during various driving conditions.
• Handles or resists any torsional stress (such as bending
or twisting of the body) that the vehicle may be subjected
to as it drives.
• It allows the vehicle to pull objects as these heavy objects
must be directly or indirectly attached to the chassis.
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Classification of the chassis

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Classification of the chassis

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Classification of the chassis

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Frame
• A frame is the main structure of the chassis of a motor vehicle. All
other components fasten to it; a term for this is design is body-on-
frame construction.

• FUNCTIONS OF THE CHASSIS FRAME:

• 1. To carry load of the passengers or goods carried in the body.
• 2. To support the load of the body, engine, gear box etc.,
• 3. To withstand the forces caused due to the sudden braking or acceleration
• 4. To withstand the stresses caused due to the bad road condition.
• 5. To withstand centrifugal force while cornering

• There are three main designs for frame rails. Their cross-sections
include:
• C-shaped
• Boxed
• Hat
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Frame
• C-shape
• By far the most common, the C-rail has been used on nearly
every type of vehicle at one time or another. It is made by
taking a flat piece of steel (usually ranging in thickness from
1/8" to 3/16") and rolling both sides over to form a c-shaped
beam running the length of the vehicle.
• Boxed
• Originally, boxed frames were made by welding two matching
c-rails together to form a rectangular tube. Modern techniques,
however, use a process similar to making c-rails in that a piece
of steel is bent into four sides and then welded where both
ends meet.
• Hat
• Hat frames resemble a "U" and may be either right-side-up or
inverted with the open area facing down. Not commonly used
due to weakness and a propensity to rust.
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C-Frame
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Different types of frame

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Various loads acting on the frame

• 1. Short duration Load -While crossing a broken patch.
• 2. Momentary duration Load - While taking a curve.
• 3. Impact Loads -Due to the collision of the vehicle.
• 4. Inertia Load -While applying brakes.
• 5. Static Loads -Loads due to chassis parts.
• 6. Over Loads -Beyond Design capacity.
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Types of frame
• There are three types of frames

• 1. Conventional frame (Ladder chassis frame)

• 2. Integral frame (unibody)
• 3. Semi-integral frame
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Types of frame
1. Conventional frame: It has two long side members and 5 to 6 cross
members joined together with the help of rivets and bolts. The frame
sections are used generally.
• a. Channel Section - Good resistance to bending
• b. Tabular Section -Good resistance to Torsion
• c. Box Section -Good resistance to both bending and torsion

2. Integral Frame: This frame is used now a days in most of the cars. There
is no frame and all the assembly units are attached to the body. All the
functions of the frame carried out by the body itself. Due to elimination of
long frame it is cheaper and due to less weight most economical also. Only
disadvantage is repairing is difficult.

3. Semi - Integral Frame: In some vehicles half frame is fixed in the front
end on which engine gear box and front suspension is mounted. It has the
advantage when the vehicle is met with accident the front frame can be
taken easily to replace the damaged chassis frame. This type of frame is
used in FIAT cars and some of the European and American cars.
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Types of frame
1. Monocoque or Unibody are the terms used to indicate
when the body of the vehicle is designed and built to
support the weight of the vehicle and perform any other
function of a chassis. This is achieved by strengthening
the floor of the vehicle, the pillars and using bracing
along various parts of the body.
2. Ladder Chassis or Body on Frame are the terms used
when the body of a vehicle is mounted to a separate
frame or chassis. This frame is similar to a ladder in
design as two long pieces of steel (approximately the
length of the vehicle) are held parallel to each other by
shorter pieces running across.
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Types of frame
3. Backbone chassis is a type of automobile construction
chassis that is similar to the body-on-frame design instead
of a two-dimensional ladder type structure.

• The idea is to create a front and rear structure that connect to a

tube that runs the entire length of the car.

• Unlike a transmission tunnel the backbone is fully enclosed to be a

rigid structure and handle all loads. It is normally very continuous
with few holes.
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Unibody
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Unibody
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Ladder Frame
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Ladder Frame
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Ladder Frame
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Ladder Frame - X bracing

• X bracing is done to increase torsional stiffness of
main frame.
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Backbone
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Comparison – Unibody Vs Body on frame

• Performance - The monocoque is a lighter design which is a
plus for fuel efficiency, it has more torsional stiffness and is by
far the better chassis for performance oriented vehicles. The
heavy nature of the ladder chassis makes it tough and it is
much better than the monocoque for carrying heavy loads and
towing heavier objects.

• Design - A unibody bodyshell is difficult to design, build and

modify (platform sharing) when compared to the body on frame
but computer aided design (CAD) makes unibody platform
sharing much easier. For body on frame vehicles its easy to
build another body even from another bodystyle and place it on
a ladder chassis as long as they are of similar dimensions.
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Comparision – Unibody Vs Body on frame

• Materials - Unitary bodyshells can be made from a
variety of materials steel and steel alloys, aluminium and
aluminium alloys and even carbon fiber or combinations
of these materials whereas ladder chassis are usually
built from steel.
• Other Benefits - It is much easier to incorporate crumple
zones into a vehicle with a monocoque body shell but a
vehicle with a ladder chassis is much easier to repair after
an accident.
• Note : Monocoque chassis are used in most vehicle types
and is more suited for everyday, luxury and sport oriented
vehicles but the ladder chassis is better suited for
commercial and heavy duty work.
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Today's Unitary Design

• Almost all cars today, a lot of SUVs and minivans and
even some pickup trucks feature unitary construction.
• Pressed sheet metal panels, channels and box sections
are joined together with some 5000 spot welds.
• Structural adhesives, self-tapping screws and rivets as
well as purely mechanical clinching techniques may also
be employed.
• Box sections are chosen because they sustain load in
multiple directions.
• Individual pieces may well be made of different materials
and certainly in different thicknesses depending on the
function and required load capacity.
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Today's Unitary Design

• One example of such a hybrid body structure cited in the
Bosch Automotive Handbook gives an analysis, by
weight, of unitary materials:
• 47 percent high-strength low-alloy steel,
• 42 percent standard steel,
• 10 percent aluminum,
• the remaining 1 percent plastic.
• The highest proportion of sheet steel is around 0.75 to 1.0
mm in thickness
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Defects in chassis frame

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Defects in chassis frame

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Automobile Body
• Body is the super structure of chassis. The bodies are
divided in two groups
• Passenger Body
• Commercial body
• Requirements of bodies for various types of vehicle
• 1. The body should be light.
• 2. It should have minimum number of components.
• 3. It should provide sufficient space for passengers and luggage.
• 4. It should withstand vibrations while in motion.
• 5. It should offer minimum resistance to air.
• 6. It should be cheap and easy in manufacturing.
• 7. It should be attractive in shape and colour.
• 8. It should have uniformly distributed load.
• 9. It should have long fatigue life
• 10.It should provide good vision and ventilation.
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Frame/body Materials
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Questions?
• Short Answer Questions:

1. List out the various components of chassis?

2. What are the functions of Chassis frame?
3. List out the types of Chassis frame?
4. What are the frame sections used in Automobiles?
5. What are the requirements of Bodies for various types of vehicles?
6. What is dumb iron in chassis?

• Essay Type Questions:

1. Draw the layout of conventional Chassis with a neat diagram and

explain about various parts on it?
2. What are the different classification of bodies used in Automobiles
and explain?
3. List and explain the various chassis frame defects.
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Resistance to vehicle motion

• This is the resistance a vehicle faces while attempting to
move from a stall condition or while accelerating.
• This resistance must be overcome by the power plant of
the engine in order to sustain motion.
• When the power produced is smaller than the resistance
to motion, the vehicle will gradually slow down.
• We must have experienced the slowing down of bicycles if
we stop pedaling. The bicycle also slows down if we go
uphill or if wind blows from front.
• A poorly inflated tire also causes the vehicle to groan
more and slow down. These are the resistances that force
the vehicle to slow down under their effect.
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Resistance to vehicle motion

• Broadly the resistances can be categorized into the
following categories:
• Aerodynamic drag
• Gradient resistance
• Rolling resistance
• Inertia
• All the above produce a restraining force working against
the tractive force.
• The tractive force must be greater than or equal to the
resistive forces in order to maintain a sustainable motion.
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Air resistance/ Aerodynamic drag

• When a body travels within a dense medium, the molecules of
the medium collide with the moving object and thereby absorb
some of the energy.
• This is felt as a resistance to the moving object. If the medium
is denser, then the resistance is more.
• Also when the object moves at a faster speed, the resistance
increases proportionately.
• Mathematically it can be expressed as:

FA = −½ × Cd × P × V²
• where
• Cd = Co−efficient of discharge
• P = Pressure
• V = Velocity of the vehicle
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Gradient resistance
• When the vehicle travels uphill, a component of its
weight works in a direction opposite to its motion.
• If some energy is not supplied to overcome this
backward force, then the vehicle would slow down,
stall and roll backwards.
• If the vehicle is trading uphill at a slope of θ, then the
weight of the vehicle, W has two components: one
perpendicular to the road surface (with a value W·Cos
θ) and the other along the road surface (with a value
W·Sin θ).
• The component along the road surface is the one that
tries to restrict the motion.
• The gradient resistance is given by: FG = W·Sin θ
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Rolling resistance
• When a vehicle rolls, it rolls with its tires in contact with
the road surface.
• The relative motion of two hard surfaces produces a
friction. Further, neither the road, nor the tire are
perfectly rigid. Hence, both flex under the load slightly.
• As there is a gradual deformation at the contact
between the road and the tire, greatest at the bottom
most point and least at the entry and exit points, the slip
of the tire w.r.t. the road produces another type of loss of
energy which results in a resistance.
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Rolling resistance
• Hard wheel rolling on and deforming a
soft surface, resulting in the reaction
force R from the surface having a
component that opposes the motion.
(W is some vertical load on the
axle, F is some towing force applied to
the axle, r is the wheel radius, and
both friction with the ground and
friction at the axle are assumed to be
negligible and so are not shown. The
wheel is rolling to the left at constant
speed.)
• Note that R is the resultant force from
non-uniform pressure at the wheel-
roadbed contact surface. This
pressure is greater towards the front of
the wheel due to hysteresis.
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Rolling resistance
• Rolling
resistance is composed of the following
components:
• Tire Rolling resistance: FR,T
• Road rolling resistance: FR,Tr
• Resistance due to tire slip angle: FR,α
• Resistance due to bearing friction and residual braking: FR,fr
• Hence the rolling resistance offered may be written as:
• FR = FR,T + FR,Tr + FR,α + FR,fr
• The tire rolling resistance FR,T is a result of the resistance
due to flexure of the tire, air resistance on the tire and
friction of tire with the road.
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Rolling resistance
• The "rolling resistance coefficient", is defined by the
following equation:

F = Crr N
• where
• ’F’ is the rolling resistance force (shown in figure 1),
• Crr is the dimensionless rolling resistance coefficient or coefficient of
rolling friction (CRF), and
• ’N’ is the normal force, the force perpendicular to the surface on which
the wheel is rolling.
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Resistance to vehicle motion

• We can balance them as
•F=F req = FA + FG + FR + FI
• where
• FA= Force due to air resistance
• FG = Force due to gradient of a slope
• FR = Force due to rolling resistance
• FI = Force due to moving or static inertia
• The last one FI comes into the picture only when the
vehicle accelerates or decelerates, while the first three
always offer a resistance even when the vehicle is moving
at a constant speed.
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Engine
• Automobile engine refers to a fuel-consuming machine or
device that is used for propelling automobiles, airplanes,
tractors, buses, two wheelers, cars etc.
• Engine forms an integral component of a vehicle that
transforms chemical energy in fuel into mechanical
energy for power.
• Usually, automobile engines make use of four strokes to
turn chemical energy into mechanical energy with the help
of combustion of gases or hydrocarbon fuel.
• Most automobile engines have four, six and eight
cylinders.
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Engine configuration
• In a multi-cylinder engine, the cylinders usually are
arranged in one of three ways: inline, V or flat (also
known as horizontally opposed or boxer), as shown in the
following figures.
• Different configurations have different advantages and
disadvantages in terms of smoothness, manufacturing
cost and shape characteristics. These advantages and
disadvantages make them more suitable for certain
vehicles.
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Flat - The cylinders are arranged in two

banks on opposite sides of the engine.
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Inline - The cylinders are arranged in a

line in a single bank.
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V - The cylinders are arranged in two

banks set at an angle to one another.
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Engine parts
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Engine parts
• Spark plug
• The spark plug supplies the spark that ignites the air/fuel
mixture so that combustion can occur. The spark must
happen at just the right moment for things to work
properly.
• Valves
• The intake and exhaust valves open at the proper time to
let in air and fuel and to let out exhaust. Note that both
valves are closed during compression and combustion so
that the combustion chamber is sealed.
• Piston
• A piston is a cylindrical piece of metal that moves up and
down inside the cylinder.
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Engine parts
• Piston rings
• Piston rings provide a sliding seal between the outer edge
of the piston and the inner edge of the cylinder. The rings
serve two purposes:
• They prevent the fuel/air mixture and exhaust in the combustion
chamber from leaking into the sump during compression and
combustion.
• They keep oil in the sump from leaking into the combustion area,
where it would be burned and lost.
• Most cars that "burn oil" and have to have a quart added
every 1,000 miles are burning it because the engine is old
and the rings no longer seal things properly.
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Engine parts
• Connecting rod
• The connecting rod connects the piston to the crankshaft.
It can rotate at both ends so that its angle can change as
the piston moves and the crankshaft rotates.
• Crankshaft
• The crankshaft turns the piston's up and down motion into
circular motion just like a crank on a jack-in-the-box does.
• Sump
• The sump surrounds the crankshaft. It contains some
amount of oil, which collects in the bottom of the sump
(the oil pan).
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Engine Valve Train and Ignition Systems

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Engine parts
• The valve train consists of the valves and a mechanism
that opens and closes them.
• The opening and closing system is called a camshaft.
The camshaft has lobes on it that move the valves up and
down.
• A timing belt or timing chain links the crankshaft to the
camshaft so that the valves are in sync with the pistons.
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Engine materials
• The engine block has traditionally been made of grey
cast iron beacause of its good wear resistance and low
cost. Passages for the cooling water are cast into the
block, Aluminum is being used is smaller SI engine
blocks to reduce engine weight.

• Cylinder block is the basic framework of a car engine.

It supports and holds all the other engine components.
this figure shows a typical cylinder block without an
integrated Crankcase.
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Variable Valve Timing

• In internal combustion engines, variable valve
timing (VVT) is the process of altering the timing of
a valve lift event, and is often used to improve
performance, fuel economy or emissions.

• It is increasingly being used in combination with variable

valve lift systems. There are many ways in which this can
be achieved, ranging from mechanical devices to electro-
hydraulic and camless systems. Increasingly strict
emissions regulations are causing many automotive
manufacturers to use VVT systems.
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Variable Valve Timing

• As you know, valves activate the breathing of engine. The
timing of breathing, that is, the timing of air intake and
exhaust, is controlled by the shape and phase angle of
cams.
• To optimise the breathing, engine requires different valve
timing at different speed. When the rev increases, the
duration of intake and exhaust stroke decreases so that
fresh air becomes not fast enough to enter the
combustion chamber, while the exhaust becomes not fast
enough to leave the combustion chamber.
• Therefore, the best solution is to open the inlet valves
earlier and close the exhaust valves later. In other words,
the Overlapping between intake period and exhaust
period should be increased as rev increases.
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1) Cam-Changing VVT
• Cam-Changing VVT
• Honda pioneered road car-used VVT in the late 80s by
launching its famous VTEC system (Valve Timing Electronic
Control). First appeared in Civic, CRX and NS-X, then became
standard in most models.
• You can see it as 2 sets of cams having different shapes to
enable different timing and lift. One set operates during normal
speed, say, below 4,500 rpm. Another substitutes at higher
speed. Obviously, such layout does not allow continuous
change of timing, therefore the engine performs modestly
below 4,500 rpm but above that it will suddenly transform into a
wild animal.
Advantage: Powerful at top end
Disadvantage: 2 or 3 stages only, non-continuous; no much improvement to torque; complex
Who use it ? Honda VTEC, Mitsubishi MIVEC, Nissan Neo VVL.
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A plastic mock-up of a Honda VTEC system that uses two

different camshaft profiles: one for low-speed engine operation
and the other for high speed.
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2) Cam-Phasing VVT
• Cam-phasing VVT is the simplest, cheapest and most
commonly used mechanism at this moment. However, its
performance gain is also the least, very fair indeed.

• Basically, it varies the valve timing by shifting the phase

angle of camshafts. For example, at high speed, the inlet
camshaft will be rotated in advance by 30° so to enable
earlier intake.

• This movement is controlled by engine management

system according to need, and actuated by hydraulic
valve gears.
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Advantage: Cheap and simple, continuous VVT improves torque delivery across the whole rev
range.
Disadvantage Lack of variable lift and variable valve opening duration, thus less top end power than
: cam-changing VVT.
Who use it ? Most car makers, such as:
· Audi V8 - inlet, 2-stage discrete
· BMW Double Vanos - inlet and exhaust, continuous
· Ferrari 360 Modena - exhaust, 2-stage discrete
· Fiat (Alfa) SUPER FIRE - inlet, 2-stage discrete
· Ford Puma 1.7 Zetec SE - inlet, 2-stage discrete
· Jaguar AJ-V6 and updated AJ-V8 - inlet, continuous
· Lamborghini Diablo SV engine - inlet, 2-stage discrete
· Porsche Variocam - inlet, 3-stage discrete
· Renault 2.0-litre - inlet, 2-stage discrete
· Toyota VVT-i - inlet, continuous
· Volvo 4 / 5 / 6-cylinder modular engines - inlet, continuous
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3) Cam-Changing + Cam-Phasing VVT

• Combining cam-changing VVT and cam-phasing VVT
could satisfy the requirement of both top-end power and
flexibility throughout the whole rev range, but it is
inevitably more complex.

Advantage: Continuous VVT improves torque delivery across the whole rev range; Variable lift and
duration lift high rev power.
Disadvantage: More complex and expensive

Who use it ? Toyota Celica GT-S

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