[SEL] Abenaque engines

[Curt]

Things seem a little slow on the lists so here is something for 
entertainment:

Every once in a while I will pull the cylinder head off of the 6 HP 
Abenaque and give it a cleaning. In preparation for our 3 day Cotton 
Ginning Days show I pulled the head off to remove carbon. Would you 
believe I scrubbed 2 full cups of carbon out before it was clean!
Last time I did this I did not have a digital camera, so this time I 
took a few pictures and thought you might enjoy seeing a couple of neat 
features of Abenaque engines.

http://www.oldengine.org/members/holland/images/Abanaque/CylinderHead002.jpg
Shows the top of the cylinder with the intake valve on the right and the 
exhaust on the left. Pretty good design in that you can fill the engine 
with all kinds of gas and oil and it will simply drain out the valves to 
clear itself.

http://www.oldengine.org/members/holland/images/Abanaque/CylinderHead003.jpg
This view shows the fuel injector just below the cylinder. Fuel is 
injected into the heated manifold below the cylinder where it vaporises 
and waits for the next intake stroke. You can also see the ornate rocker 
arms that operate both the intake and exhaust valves off of the side shaft.

http://www.oldengine.org/members/holland/images/Abanaque/CylinderHead005.jpg
It's a bit hard to see but the cylinder head has a hemi shape to it with 
the mag/ignitor sitting in the middle.

The patents on this engine are listed as 1898. I think it is pretty neat 
that engineer John Ostenburg designed features like fuel injection and 
hemispherical combustion heads this early in the engine era.

Hope you've enjoyed these.
Curt Holland
Gastonia, NC