Electromechanical Valve Actuator for Variable Valve Timing

Most exciting article I've read about it yet. Would open up a new frontier in engine design. I'm wondering if such engines should be made non-interference and what one loses from that. If they were interference seems like one software burp and the engine is junk.

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

New BMW engines: No throttle | News & Analysis content from WardsAuto

I thought that BMW had been doing something like this for a while. While it seems that the BMW version still has a cam (it just has a variable follower and cam angle indexing...) the intent is conserved (ie: no throttle body and flat torque curves...?)

this article is dated 2001, I didnt think that BMW got rid of throttle bodies until 2008 or 2009 (so the idea hasnt spread like wildfire...yet?...)...but hopefully some else here can shed more light than I.

-John

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2009 Kia Sedona
2009 Honda Odyssey EX-L
12006 Jetta Pumpe Duse
(insert Mercedes here)

Husband, Father, sometimes friend =)

Cool concept. If FIA would ban pneumatic valve springs we'd probably see massive development of this technology very quickly.

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Whoever said there's nothing more expensive than a cheap Mercedes never had a cheap Jaguar.

83 300D Turbo with manual conversion, early W126 vented front rotors and H4 headlights 400,xxx miles
08 Suzuki GSX-R600 M4 Slip-on 22,xxx miles
88 Jaguar XJS V12 94,xxx miles. Work in progress.

Maybe. I know very little about this but seems I've caught wind of limits, so far, on how fast and often these things can cycle. At 3000 rpm, each set of valves opens 25 times a second. At a common F1 speed, 18,000 rpm, it is 150 times a second. It's bit mind boggling, I gather that the pneumatic springs are more certain than steel springs. I know that the air spring pellet guns have advantage over similar guns with a steel spring. Air molecules don't fatigue.

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K