▲So i'll throw this out there. When I was a growing up back in the 50's (yeah, way back then) I was given a model of a v-8 engine to build. It was clear plastic, had pistons, crankshaft, valves, and little red lights for the spark plugs. Small battery powered motor (I think in the starter motor) made everything go round and rounds. One of the coolest models I ever built as a kid.
reply▲The Visible V-8. That made it well into the 70s.
reply▲@AngeTheGreat on youtube is worth mentioning here, I think.
He has a whole series on building out engine simulators of various types, and even published a Steam game for steam engine simulation.
His work is notable because he leans heavily into generating sound directly from the simulations.
Yes, seriously everyone should watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/@AngeTheGreat
Other engine simulators work by approximating the engine.
Ange's engine simulator works by approximating physics of air fluid dynamics through a combustion chamber and exhaust, sound propagation, etc and then putting an engine into that simulation.
It's incredible how productive and precise he is.
Absolutely insane.
Also, I love that it was open sourced. Although it sounds like from the GitHub page summary that there was some shenanigans involving a "certain very high profile game studio" that I'd love to hear more tea about.
He published it as open-source for like 5 seconds before taking the repository down in order to charge for it on Steam! I'm a little weirded out by that pattern of open-sourcing it and then just changing his mind.
reply▲chris_money2026 hours ago
[-] "How it Works" -> "Idk" OP probably
reply▲monkellipse5 hours ago
[-] I see no declaration that this is a machine generated site, but the aesthetic is a dead giveaway. The language on the “how it works” page is unmistakably LLM output. As a total novice in engines this site had the potential to educate me, but did the author vet the data at all? If the author doesn’t bother telling me they checked any output on this, what assurance do I have anything is accurate on the site at all? If I knew an actual engineer put their focus on this tool I’d feel much better about trying to learn something from it. Short of that it’s just a pretty (but predictable) interface.
reply▲I'm a mechanical engineer who has written similar tools for work and hobbies. Producing pretty pictures does not mean that the model is physically accurate. Unfortunately, such tools seem be evaluated much more on flashiness and not on more reliable and objective criteria like physical accuracy based on verification and validation test suites. I'm seeing that in the comments here. I don't think LLMs make what I do irrelevant, but I have thought that I'm going to have to improve how flashy my simulations look to compete better with non-experts who use LLMs.
reply▲Waterluvian4 hours ago
[-] The aesthetic is what I get any time I ask for something UI-like in Claude. But gosh darn it I like the look.
reply▲burnt_toast3 hours ago
[-] Nice little project, I inputted the dimensions of a engine I've been building (b20-vtec) and it estimated 160whp which sounds low but I also can't set up my cams properly because it looks like this was designed for SOHC engines.
Very cool either way.
Calling this AI slop would be generous. If we made a list of the things wrong with it we would be here all day. Nothing has an effect on redline RPM, you can create compression and turbo combos that would instantly grenade an engine, the preset “super car” has 200hp?
The only thing it illustrates is the authors lack of understanding.
Exhaust temp increase with decreasing lambda, and peaks at 0.7 lambda. That part of the model is likely incorrect.
reply▲this is really impressive. actual movements with live diagrams looks great. you can consider adding sound to take it to another level.
reply▲So if I set the animation speed to 1:1 and set the RPM to 3000, that's what it would look like inside the engine when I'm ready to shift gears? Seems WAY faster than what I expected in real life
reply▲mikestorrent3 hours ago
[-] 3000? Here I am wishing there was some Wankel Rotary representation and you're shifting at 3000? What are you driving, a Peterbilt?
reply▲I am genuinely curious why OP thinks this slop post should be of interest to others. Nobody cares how you're prompting an LLM, guys.
reply▲187 N/A BSFC @ 2000rpm and open throttle. Tried emulating a DI 2GR-FXE. Seems a bit optimistic, but still fun to play with.
reply▲bwestergard5 hours ago
[-] I don't understand how the throttle and RPM can be modified independently. Surely the RPM depends on the throttle?
reply▲In principle you can instantaneously set the throttle opening to some position and set the RPM to whatever you want. In time the RPM will rise or fall until the engine is at equilibrium, but throttle position and RPM aren't like mechanically interlocked. Otherwise how could the engine speed up when you go down a hill?
reply▲mikestorrent3 hours ago
[-] When you press the gas pedal in your car down (which used to just be a cable to the throttle body), does your car instantaneously increase in speed to match the pedal position?
All you're doing is letting more air in - the RPM is a function of the power the engine generates; more fuel and air than is currently needed for the current load at the current speed = increasing RPMs.
If you put the clutch in, a little blip of the gas is all that's needed to get the RPM quite high very quickly. The moment there's load on there, the same blip will not do very much at all.
Imagine your vehicle is pulling a heavy load up a hill vs. going flat out on a track. Your throttle position may be the same but the RPMs are likely to be quite different, even when you account for the transmission.
reply▲3638 kW / 4878 hp is the most powerful engine I could build with this.
reply▲I imagine such an engine would instantly blow itself apart in real life. Basically the simulated version of those tractor pull cars where the engine survives for about 500 rotations before it has to be rebuilt.
reply▲CrimsonRain3 hours ago
[-] 3765 kW / 5049 hp is the max I could do.
V Twin Bank, Turbocharged with Intercooler. And Fuel is Hydrogen!
How do you tell how much power it is making?
reply▲On the dyno panel you see "pk" which is peak power. If you don't see the dyno panel on the right, you'll have to scroll down to see it.
reply▲Am I missing something? Setting the throttle to 0% seems to do nothing?
reply▲All the gauges on the top right except the RPMs move
reply▲I was hoping for a two stroke mode as well!
reply▲really interesting project - would be good to see a link to a repo
reply▲quantumHazer5 hours ago
[-] Probably llm slop
reply▲if its useful and entertaining i dont think many ppl care especially evident that you cannot be certain with your accusations
reply▲How is it useful? I'm no expert in combustion engines, so I'd hesitate to rely on a slop graphic like this to learn about them as I doubt the
creator has any idea about them either.
It's like a friend - he was like "Look at this awesome set of categorized interactive animations from claude to learn geometry!".
And like 60% of the animations were technically just wrong. Very pretty though, and the effects were cute... I guess...?
would be awesome if it could generate sounds like how lfs does it
reply▲AtomicOrbital1 hour ago
[-] we have all heard of V8 ... now visualize a W12
... two pairs of V3 in a Bentley
goodmythical58 minutes ago
[-] Airplanes do (did?) v16s and v24s as well, if memory serves.
There's also a build out there where someone did a "v12" vw beetle with a v6 for each axle.
How can I instantly tell this is slop?
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