alt Hacker NewsI recently bought a hybrid, and had been trying to wrap my brain around how it had an Atkinson engine in it. Was imagining a solenoid-driven crankshaft linkage or similar. Loved learning from this video that the secret is in valve timing and not fancy linkages.
But. The other points made felt muddled or even contradictory. I either didn't follow the TC guy's explanation closely enough, or the script could have used another pass.
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Szpadel • yesterday at 12:34 PM
I'm assuming that right now all valves as computer controlled so why we cannot have best of both worlds? cannot we dynamically switch between Otto and Atkinson cycles by just changing valve profiles?
computer could use Otto cycle in case more power is needed in rare situations
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Watching the graphs during the driving segment helped me more than his explanation, but maybe I'm visual about it? It's interesting to see when the battery is being used.
I've seen some modern hybrids just have a visualizer for this on the dash to encourage you to coast more and things, which seems about as helpful in understanding it too.