Balancer Shaft Development for an In-line 4-Cylinder High Speed Diesel Engine

Abstract

Internal combustion engine noise and vibration is a major issue for car makers, and this is even more important for High-Level Pick-ups and SUV’s which applies the modern diesel engines. One important player in this scenario is the second-order unbalanced forces vibration produced for the conventional inline 4 cylinder engine configurations, which leads to highfrequency excitation of vehicle’s structure and consequent internal noise. This paper studies the balancer shaft solution for the mentioned engine configuration, as well as major design alternatives and development process and issues. This paper also presents an example of balancer shaft design and development for a high speed diesel engine, as well as proposes a design-decision matrix methodology applied. Such methodology, which can be applied to any design or engineering case, is a way to design engineers to make the right decision amongst the different options that are always offered by a very simple and objective matrix.