Transmigrated as the Crown Prince

Yannick convened the heads of Mercedes-Benz, Maybach, Skoda, Porsche and other companies to discuss the development progress of tank engines.

"Your Highness, there are several new engines that can be put into mass production immediately. Maybach's HL230 gasoline engine, 700 horsepower; Mercedes (Benz)'s MB 507 water-cooled diesel engine, constant power of 700 horsepower, short-term limit Power is 850 horsepower; Porsche's Sla 16 air-cooled diesel engine, 750 horsepower; KHD's T8 M118 V8 two-stroke water-cooled diesel engine, with a maximum power of 800 horsepower.

In addition, Maybach's HL 234 gasoline engine, which is about to be developed, has a power of up to 900 horsepower; Mercedes-Benz's MB 507 water-cooled diesel engine high-power version has a constant power of 850 horsepower and a short-term limit power of 1,000 horsepower. "

Yannick nodded with satisfaction, muttering to himself that the Maybach company had completely monopolized the gasoline engine market.

So far, German tanks have all used gasoline engines. Yannick is somewhat hesitant whether the heavy tanks that are about to be put into production will continue to use gasoline engines or switch to diesel engines.

The Germans in the original time and space started from the No. 1 tank and have been tirelessly racing on the road of gasoline engines with their eyes closed. At that time, the Panther's HL230 engine was the world's smallest, most fuel-efficient, most powerful, and most output tank engine with over 600 horsepower. It left behind the diesel engines that were not very mature at the time. This is why the Panther was favored by many military forces. Fans consider it one of the best medium tank designs of World War II.

As for why German tanks did not use diesel engines in World War II, many military fans believe that Germany lacked fuel and allocated most of the diesel to the navy to meet the needs of marine engines. But this is not the case. Although the German Army nominally uses gasoline as a standardized fuel, during World War II, various factories within the German war economic system produced a total of as many as 150,000 military diesel vehicles, making diesel engines more common in the Army motor vehicle. Have a place in the army. For example, the Mercedes-Benz L3000 was the flagship model of Mercedes-Benz during World War II, and the larger L4500 also used diesel power. In addition to Mercedes-Benz, the main military models of Bushing-Nag, KHD and MAN are also mainly diesel-powered.

Moreover, the United States on the other side of the Atlantic also has gasoline engine tanks (except for the two diesel engines M4A2 and M4A4). As mentioned earlier, the United States accounted for more than half of the world's oil production at that time, and they were not short of oil. Even if the United States does not have diesel engine technology reserves, it has aided the Soviet Union with so many supplies. Isn’t it a piece of cake for the Soviet Union to provide diesel engine technology?

The Americans did study the Soviet diesel engines. In 1942, several Soviet tanks were transported to the "Aberdeen Weapons Proving Ground" in Maryland in the eastern United States and began a series of tests, including T-34, KV-1 and so on.

During the test, after the T-34 traveled 343 kilometers, its engine was completely scrapped and could not be repaired. The Americans found that it was due to the "air filter" and the engine simply could not get enough air to maintain the engine running at full load. Moreover, a large amount of dust and particles enter the cylinder, causing cylinder wear and output to decrease.

It was not without cost for the Soviet Union to put the V-2 diesel engine into the tank. The aluminum frame not only reduced weight, but also shortened the life of the engine. "Fortunately" most T-34s did not survive their already extremely short lifespan and were destroyed by the Germans, making this shortcoming less obtrusive.

At that time, the Soviet Union produced a large number of low-end general-purpose machine tools with low technical content. Until the United States and the United Kingdom provided high-end machine tools and special machine tools to the Soviet Union (the United States provided 1,000 machine tools to the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom provided 5 Thousands of machine tools), the quality of manufactured components has been improved, and the engine life has also been improved.

Although the performance of the T-34 was not very satisfactory, the Americans did not give up and installed General Motors' GM-6046 engine and mechanical transmission into the M4 tank, turning it into the M4A2 model. It turns out that this thing is not only less powerful than the R-975 gasoline engine most commonly used in the Sherman series, but also more bulky. The M4A4 used for export (installed with a Chrysler A57 diesel engine) needs to be extended and enlarged to accommodate the new power system, which also affects the M4A4's combat capabilities.

As a result, Lieutenant General Jacobs, the Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Army Armor Forces at the time, issued an order: All Army units were not allowed to use diesel Shermans in operations outside the homeland (rear area). The M4A2 and M4A4 produced are supported by other allies or lost to the Marine Corps.

But no matter what, thinking about the phasing out of gasoline engines by the armies of various countries in the future, Yannick knew that following the trend was the most correct decision.

"How about exhaust gas turbocharging technology?" The diesel engine itself has a low speed. If you want to increase power, the best and easiest way is to use supercharging technology. In later generations, there are mainly two types: mechanical supercharging and exhaust gas turbocharging. Among them, exhaust gas turbocharging technology is the most widely used due to its higher energy efficiency ratio.

The principle is that the high-temperature and high-speed gas discharged from the cylinder of the internal combustion engine is fed into the turbine of the turbocharger through the exhaust pipe, driving the turbine to rotate, and the turbine then drives the compressor impeller coaxial with it to rotate. The compressor compresses the inhaled air, and the air with increased pressure flows through the intake pipe of the internal combustion engine and is supplied to the cylinder to achieve the purpose of supercharging.

Moreover, this exhaust gas turbocharging technology is not an advanced technology of later generations. As early as 1905, two Swiss engineers successively proposed a turbocharging scheme and conducted early experiments on diesel engine constant pressure supercharging and pulse supercharging systems. Exhaust gas turbocharging was used on marine engines, and then aviation piston engines also adopted supercharging technology.

In later generations, not only tanks used abandoned turbocharging technology, but also general high-power internal combustion engines such as diesel engines in trains, trucks, tanks, excavators, large engineering machinery, ships, etc. all adopted this system. After supercharging, the engine power can be increased by 40% to 60% or even more than the original engine.

"Your Highness, all technical difficulties of exhaust gas turbocharging have been overcome and it can be put into use."

"Very good," Yannick, who was about to announce that the newly developed tanks in the future would use diesel engines, suddenly remembered gas turbines.

This was a thing exclusively used by the tanks of the largest military power in later generations (originally the Russian T-80 also used a gas turbine, but production was discontinued, and the subsequent T-90 was changed back to a diesel engine).

How about continuing to use gasoline engines for more than ten years and then jumping directly to gas turbines?

After pondering for a long time, Yannick still shook his head and gave up the idea. Even if it is a diesel engine, I am afraid it can still be used for 100 years. Moreover, the Leopard 2 that will use a diesel engine in later generations may not lose to the M1.

(Sorry, there is only one chapter today)