Otto-Langen Atmospheric Engine

The Otto-Langen Atmospheric Engine

The Beau de Rochas Patents. Some good was accomplished by, however, by the effort directed towards the manufacture of the Lenoir machine. The attention of inventors and scientists, so long directed towards the development of the steam engine, was redirected to the gas engine, and led to the important experiments and works of Beau de Rochas, N. A. Otto, and Eugene Langen, during the period 1861 to 1878. In 1862, Rochas patented the specifications for an engine in which the charge passed through four distinct phases in one cycle of operations, briefly described as follows: The charge was drawn into the cylinder during the first forward stroke of the piston, compressed during the return stroke, ignited and exploded at the beginning of the second forward stroke, and the burnt gases expelled by the second return stroke. These specifications defined an engine far superior to any of the machines produced up to that time, but although he was on the very threshold of success, Rochas failed to build an engine under his patents, and they remained practically unnoticed for sixteen years.

The Otto-Langen Atmospheric Engine. About the same time (1862) Otto, then a young German merchant, built an experimental engine on a somewhat similar principle, but abandoned it for want of success. Subsequently, in 1867, with the assistance of Eugene Langen, he produced a vertical engine in which a “free piston” was driven upwards by the explosion of the charge in the cylinder, giving working power only on the downward stroke under the pressure of the atmosphere. Although crude in construction, it consumed only about one-halt the amount of gas required by the Lenoir engine, and not only demonstrated the advantage of compression, but was the first atmospheric engine to attain any commercial importance, for it came into somewhat extensive use notwithstanding its defects.

Fig. 8, shows a side elevation of the engine.