FortNine at it again

[Sumo66]

Ryan started off a couple of years ago making videos for a Montreal company (before it was Fort Nine) when he was a student at McGill U. He just kept getting better and better with higher production values. I really enjoy his sense of humour. He only reviews products that he and Fort Nine purchase...he will not review freebies because of the inherent tendency to provide a good review for something that was free. He now makes these videos from his native British Columbia. I am a subscriber to his regular schedule and enjoy almost every one.

 

[ST Gui]

he will not review freebies because of the inherent tendency to provide a good review for something that was free.

There are two sides to that coin. Another reason not to review "review units" is the inherent tendency for viewers to believe the reviewer was influenced by the freebie (whether it was free or not) regardless of whether or not the review was actually influenced by the status.

It's clear many YT reviewers especially like getting review units and give "friendly" reviews for that purpose. 90% of them are clowns that couldn't make it in a circus. Same for a lot of Amazon "reviewers"

I think any principled ethical reviewer should avoid "review units" for the appearance of impropriety which is probably far more common than actually being adversely influenced by them. Refusing them avoids that pitfall as well.

 

[dwalby]

Well, in this case his video wasn't so much a review, but more like his own editorial on how a modern engine design by Indian can blow away an ancient engine design like Harley in terms of HP.

Unfortunately, his arguments were mostly his own imagination and not engineering fact.

If I understood it correctly, and please correct me if I'm wrong, his premise was that Indian used modern techniques like overhead cams, water cooling, and square or over-square piston bore/stroke to achieve a substantial HP increase over Harley engines of a similar displacement. What a couple of us have already mentioned in passing, is that he over-simplified a very complex topic to provide arguments that support his own conclusions, but his arguments weren't technically correct.

For example, there's nothing inherently bad with pushrod valve actuation in terms of HP production. GM has been putting high-HP pushrod engines in Corvettes and Camaros for decades, the LS-7 being a good example of that. The reality is pushrods have some benefits, and some drawbacks, as do overhead cam designs, so the discussion on which method is better depends on the goals of the engine design, and its not a simple discussion. But his message was "pushrods bad, overhead cams good", which isn't just oversimplified, its not accurate. His penis references to the pushrods didn't help his credibility either.

Same with over-square vs. under-square, there are advantages and disadvantages to either, so choosing one over the other depends on the goal of the engine design. Again, his message was "under-square bad, over-square good". I think he also suggested that Harleys were under-square because the long pushrods demand that geometry, which is also not true. Again, the LS-7 is an example of a pushrod engine with a nearly square bore/stroke.

Air vs. liquid cooling is a bit easier call to make, no argument there, but it wouldn't make anywhere near 43% HP difference.

But the final fact that he totally overlooked, and was pointed out earlier is how Harley pistons attach to the crankshaft, which is fairly odd, and robs the engine of a lot of HP. When Honda got into the large V-twin engine class in the '80s, they went with water cooling, overhead cam, and a more square bore/stroke, just like Indian did many years later. The result was a substantial HP improvement over Harley. But then, when customers requested that the bike sound more like a Harley, Honda put out a new version with a piston/crank orientation similar to Harley, and the HP dropped back down to Harley levels.

So, anybody familiar with engine design would have realized that the crank orientation was the single most important factor in why Harleys make so little HP, yet he totally missed that point, and his credibility went to zero as a result. The factors he did discuss are all tradeoffs when designing an engine, and are important to consider, but didn't actually produce the cause/effect he was claiming they did.

edit: I did a bit more research on this topic and found a third variation on the Honda engine that I wasn't aware of before, which changes the facts of this story. At the same time Honda introduced the Harley-like crank version in 1995, they updated the original 1985 version as well, and the HP of the non-Harley crank version dropped as a result of the update. So, the crank configuration didn't play as big a role as I first thought. It did cause the HP to drop, but by maybe 15-20% instead of 40%. I still contend that other points I mentioned above regarding pushrods and squareness of the engine weren't necessarily the only underlying reasons for the Harley HP being so low to begin with, but I have to admit that crank orientation was apparently not nearly as significant as I had claimed. It was a significant contributor, but there were other factors that contributed as well that were likely due to some of the things Ryan mentioned in his video, and the fact that the Harley design was antiquated to begin with and inefficient in many ways.

Another point that can be made though with the new discovery of the 3rd engine type is that even when Honda went to overhead cam, water cooling, and a more square bore/stroke, their design produced just over 60HP out of that engine, compared to Harley's low-50s, so its not like making those changes was a night and day improvement either. The fact that they got 78HP out of essentially the same design 10 years earlier proves the one common theme that gets mentioned over and over in this thread, the devil is in the details no matter which engine configuration you start with. Its not what you do, its how well you do it, and that part involves a lot of modeling, prototyping, and testing to optimize a design. Internal combustion design has some theory to guide the design, but there's a lot more empirical data gathering to fine tune the design than in a lot of other engineering pursuits because of the extreme complexity of what happens inside an engine while it runs.

 

[Sadlsor]

Ahhhhh....
Shades of Kevin Cameron, author of the monthly TDC column in Cycle magazine.
RIP, Cycle. Another victim of digitized America.

 

[MaxPete]

I do not wish to put anyone down or start an argument (there is plenty of that going on right now about other much more important issues), but actually, the statement that H-Ds are low on power strictly or even largely, because of the crankshaft arrangement, is not entirely correct.

Here are some facts:

• one horsepower = 746 Watts (same thing by which light bulbs are sized) and the horsepower is defined as the product of torque and RPM (with some fudge factors to work out the units).
• The actual formula (as stated by Ryan, I believe) is: HP = (torque (in foot lbs) x RPM) / 5252
• Torque is determined by the mean effective pressure (MEP) in the cylinder which is a result of the combustion process and the crankpin offset (which is half of the stroke of the piston).

It really is as "simple" as that. So, to get more horsepower you can:

1. increase the crankpin offset (or the stroke, if you like) - assuming the MEP doesn't decrease with increased stroke;
2. increase the MEP of the cylinder(s) - which means improving the combustion process by using a better head-piston crown design, better intake and exhaust tract design with better valve geometry, better fuelling (carb or EFI), incorporating turbo- or mechanical supercharging to increase the charge density, or by simply increasing the compression ratio;
3. increase the RPM at which the power is measured - assuming the torque doesn't decrease with increased RPM, of course.

Now, each of the above solutions to the horsepower issue has its own set of problems:

1. increasing the stroke will increase the peak piston speed which generally leads to increased engine wear (especially pistons, rings and crankshaft components) and can make it tough to get the fuel-air mixture in and the exhaust out quickly. It can also increase the level of engine vibration - to one degree or another depending on the arrangement of the cylinders (number of cylinders, bank angle and crank-pin orientation etc.).
2. some of the the methods of increasing MEP will also increase peak piston crown, cylinder head and valve temperatures which can cause durability problems and others (such as the improvement of intake and exhaust tract geometry will help, but increasing the valve count and cam lift and duration can add complexity). Some of these tactics are not easy to duplicate in large volume production and for some engine configurations, they aren't always feasible because of space limitations. There can also be noise and emissions problems which make achieving government approvals a challenge.
3. increasing the RPM is a good plan - but it can also entail serious durability problems for long-stroke engines (again, rings, pistons, cylinders and valve components due to higher speeds) and depending on the engine geometry (i.e. V8, V-twin, flat four etc.) it can lead to very difficult vibration and rocking couple issues which impact occupant comfort.

So, you see, as in almost every engineering problem, there is no single and simple solution, in effect, there is no free lunch. Most successful solutions involve a combination of approaches in various measures to arrive at the one that is optimal for the application.

For example, Japanese bikes generally use:

• over-square designs (larger diameter pistons which travel through shorter strokes). This lowers peak piston speeds and allows for higher operating RPM without undue vibration or durability problems.
• more cylinders with more valves per cylinder and overhead camshafts (which enables higher RPMs because the moving parts are lighter and enable a better distribution of intake charge and exhaust pulses). This helps to improve MEP by promoting a more efficient combustion process while maintaining lower vibration, reduced operating temperatures and lower noise levels.
• liquid cooling (which allows for tighter piston-cylinder fits and thus improves MEP, fuel economy and running consistency and durability).
• ...and of course, nowadays, every OEM uses fuel injection, which does not necessarily, in itself, increase horsepower - but it does provide more consistent running and permits closer control of the combustion process over a wider range of engine RPM and load conditions.

So why do Harley engines make less power than other large-bore brands? Well, as Ryan said, it has to do with their traditional engine design which has a tight 45 deg. Vee formation that makes having better intake and exhaust tract designs difficult. They also use an under-square design (smaller bore / longer-stroke engine due to a large crank-pin offset) which does not permit high RPM operation due to high reciprocating forces and higher peak piston speeds, in addition to being a challenge with long slender pushrods.

And finally, some of their bikes are still air-cooled which means that they need to be run a little richer (either by a carb or EFI) than optimum to ensure that they don't burn valves and piston crowns during high temp operation. That is also the reason why the air-cooled models cannot make the latest emission standards and it is also why BMW doesn't sell airhead twins any longer.

....also, Harley riders like the sound and vibration that these big slow-turning engines produce....and that helps to sell bikes to their demographic - which is afterall, the entire idea of being in business in the first place.

Sorry, but the crankshaft configuration is only peripherally involved in all of this. Basically, it affects the peak permissible RPM - but that is its only effect on the horsepower produced by an engine. Afterall, the Suzuki SV650:

• is a vee-twin;
• uses liquid cooling, overhead camshafts and four valves per cylinder (which fit easily because of the 90 degree cylinder angle);
• has a 10,700 RPM redline (ahhhh - remember that HP = torque x RPM x some fudge factors to work out the units);
• produces a peak power of 75 HP;
• ....on a displacement that is only 1/3 that of a 118 cu.in. (that is 1920cc sports fans) Harley Davidson.

Someone raised the issue of two different model bikes that produced differing peak horsepower values on the same displacement. The notion was advanced that the only difference was the crankshaft geometry. I'll bet that is not the only difference. I would bet that the valve opening-closing geometry was different due to different camshafts and that the RPM was lower in the lower HP engine. I'll bet it was tuned for higher torque at a lower engine RPM so that it felt and sounded more like a....Harley Davidson. More torque at a lower RPM will generally (depending on the math...) result in lower peak horsepower.

EDIT: I fixed a typo (merci beaucoup Pierre) and thought I'd add a few words about why later models of that Honda produce lower power. I suspect that either Honda wanted to tune the bikes for more low/mid-range torque or they could not meet the emissions regs. at the higher power levels so they simply de-tuned the engine. Whatever the reason, either of those goals could be met with re-programming the EFI system and leaving everything else alone on the engine.

Do the math....and you will understand.

 

[dwalby]

Someone raised the issue of two different model bikes that produced differing peak horsepower values on the same displacement. The notion was advanced that the only difference was the crankshaft geometry. I'll bet that is not the only difference. I would bet that the valve opening-closing geometry was different due to different camshafts and that the RPM was lower in the lower HP engine. I'll bet it was tuned for higher torque at a lower engine RPM so that it felt and sounded more like a....Harley Davidson. More torque at a lower RPM will generally (depending on the math...) result in lower peak horsepower.

regarding your bet, you would likely lose that bet,

The story at the time was that the Harley-sound engine started with the same engine as the non-Harley-sound bike, and the cylinder firing sequence was changed by re-arranging the connecting rods to a single-pin crankshaft attachment, similar to what Harley uses in their engines. The story also seems to have been captured on the Internet.



There was no mention that the cams were changed in any way, or that the engine tuning was changed at all.

Here are the basic engine specs for the two engines in question, what is reported is mostly the same, with the minor change in compression ratio:

Honda VT1100C2 (the Harley crank configuration):

45° V-twin 3 valves/cylinder, overhead cam
1099cc displacement
Bore x Stroke 87.5mm x 91.4mm
liquid cooled
2 x 36mm Keihin carbs
8.5:1 compression ratio
53 BHP @5500RPM

Honda VT1100C (the normal crank configuration):

45° V-twin 3 valves/cylinder, overhead cam
1099cc displacement
Bore x Stroke 87.5mm x 91.4mm
liquid cooled
2 x 36mm Keihin carbs
9.0:1 compression ratio
78 BHP @6000RPM

So why do Harley engines make less power than other large-bore brands? Well, as Ryan said, it has to do with their traditional engine design which has a tight 45 deg. Vee formation that makes having better intake and exhaust tract designs difficult. They also use an under-square design (smaller bore / longer-stroke engine due to a large crank-pin offset) which does not permit high RPM operation due to high reciprocating forces and higher peak piston speeds, in addition to being a challenge with long slender pushrods.

The VT1100C has a 45° V formation, yet is capable of producing 78HP. So the narrow 45° V configuration can't be entirely to blame for intake/exhaust tract design difficulties causing the low HP on the Harley.

The VT1100C2 has a nearly square design, yet still makes only 53HP, so an under-square design alone can't be the cause or the HP would have gone up by changing to a more square design.

I'm not saying that the Harley design couldn't be improved upon by having better intake/exhaust flow, different bore/stroke dimensions, overhead cams, etc. I'm simply saying that in this case Honda addressed some of those design concerns with their original V-twin engine, and increased the HP by almost 50% over Harley's design. Then, by simply changing the crank configuration to the Harley style, all those other gains were instantly lost. Therefore, if we assume that the crank had to have the Harley configuration, then it would appear that all the other design changes were irrelevant with regards to having any affect on the ultimate HP the engine produced with that crank configuration.

And, conversely, if we kept the original Harley engine design and simply changed the crank configuration to something more efficient, the resulting HP may be similar to the Honda and Indian designs anyway. I have absolutely no proof of that being the case, but if the Honda engine lost that much HP due to changing the crank configuration its not impossible to believe that the Harley engine would experience positive HP gains by changing its crank configuration to be more like the Honda/Indian design.

 

[MaxPete]

Uh huh.

Well, a couple of things on all of that:

• the compression ratio was lower on the H-D clone (8.5:1 versus 9:00:1) - and that will definitely reduce the MEP which will reduce horsepower (a half-point drop in CR is a significant change).
• the peak horsepower rating of the H-D clone engine was quoted at 5500 RPM - or 500 RPM lower than the non-H-D clone bike (i.e. about 9.1%) and so even if nothing else had changed, that would account for a 9.1% reduction in horsepower (that would be around 6.5 HP down from 78 HP of the non-clone version);
• the fact that they were quoting peak power at a lower engine speed means that the engine was optimized for a lower speed operation. OEMs nearly always quote peak power (at whatever speed) - so the fact that the best the clone could do was 53 HP at the lower speed means that the engine certainly WAS tuned for lower RPM operation.
• As stated in the article, there were acoustics and NVH (noise vibration and harshness) reasons for optimizing it at the lower RPM - they wanted it to sound and feel more like a Harley. I'll bet it really bugged those Honda engineers to dumb-down their engine just to get a certain sound and feel.
• In fact, I would wager that they also modified the engine mounts to allow the engine to shake around more for that "authentic Harley feel of power".

You may of course, believe what you wish, but in my experience, most moto-journalists wouldn't know a camshaft profile from a bowl of Corn Flakes and so just because they don't mention it, doesn't mean it wasn't changed.

 

[dwalby]

Uh huh.

Well, a couple of things on all of that:

• the compression ratio was lower on the H-D clone (8.5:1 versus 9:00:1) - and that will definitely reduce the MEP which will reduce horsepower (a half-point drop in CR is a significant change).
• the peak horsepower rating of the H-D clone engine was quoted at 5500 RPM - or 500 RPM lower than the non-H-D clone bike (i.e. about 9.1%) and so even if nothing else had changed, that would account for a 9.1% reduction in horsepower (that would be around 7.3 HP down from 78 of the non-clone);
• the fact that they were quoting peak power at a lower engine speed means that the engine was optimized for a lower speed operation. OEMs nearly always quote peak power (at whatever speed) - so the fact that the best the clone could do was 53 HP at the lower speed means that the engine certainly WAS tuned for lower RPM operation.
• As stated in the article, there were acoustics and NVH (noise vibration and harshness) reasons for optimizing it at the lower RPM - they wanted it to sound and feel more like a Harley. I'll bet it really bugged those Honda engineers to dumb-down their engine just to get a certain sound and feel.

You may, of course believe what you wish, but in my experience, most moto-journalists wouldn't know a camshaft profile from a bowl of Corn Flakes and so just because they don't mention it, doesn't mean it wasn't changed.

Looking at the parts fiche the cams/valves/springs for both engines are identical part numbers, as are the cylinder heads. Pretty much all the engine components appear to be identical part numbers on the fiche, with the exception of the crankshafts, where both variations are shown on the fiche diagram. So its quite possible that the reason none of those things were mentioned was actually because none of them were changed.

edit: A bit more research into this topic revealed that there are actually 3 versions of this motor, not just the two I was already aware of. The 78HP version was the original from 1985, and only existed in the non-Harley crank orientation. The 53HP Harley-like version wasn't developed until 1995, at which time they also revised the original version as well. The non-Harley crank version of the revised motor was no longer 78HP, it was lower as well. Quoted figures vary by source, but it appears that the HP differential due to crank configuration was much less than I originally believed, based on the original motor 78HP rating. So, while it is true that the Harley crank orientation dropped the HP rating, it wasn't from 78 to 53, it was more like from the low-60s to 53. The parts fiche comparisons I did were for the two 1995-era motors, the VT1100C and VT1100C2, which do appear to be identical other than the crank. The 1995 non-Harley version is not identical to the original 1985 version, even though both bikes are called the VT1100C.

Another point that can be made though with the new discovery of the 3rd engine type is that even when Honda went to overhead cam, water cooling, and a more square bore/stroke, their design produced just over 60HP out of that engine, compared to Harley's low-50s, so its not like making those changes was a night and day improvement either. The fact that they got 78HP out of essentially the same design 10 years earlier proves the one common theme that gets mentioned over and over in this thread, the devil is in the details no matter which engine configuration you start with. Its not what you do, its how well you do it, and that part involves a lot of modeling, prototyping, and testing to optimize a design. Internal combustion design has some theory to guide the design, but there's a lot more empirical data gathering to fine tune the design than in a lot of other engineering pursuits because of the extreme complexity of what happens inside an engine while it runs.

 

[paulcb]

Another interesting video from Ryan. I came away feeling like there was something missing, some test not done, like maybe a more real life, long term test that could be done.

 

[MaxPete]

Here’s another oldie, but goodie.....

 

[MaxPete]

...and another....

 

[beemerphile]

Ya'll leave my boy Ryan alone. He's a good kid. Funny, smart, entertaining. HIs production talents and sly humor can carry him through the occasional technical lapse.

Roll the next FortNine video,; pass the ; and ya'll sit down in front!

 

[mello dude]

Ryan reminds me of the guy on the very old show... Twilight Zone.....Ryan has similar speech cadence and voice. Heck, he even looks like he could be the Twilight guys son........

 

[rwthomas1]

Buell was able to get over 100hp, with a warranty, and passing Fed standards, out of the Harley design. Factory Harleys are tuned very mild. It's easy to get more, even if an antiquated design. FortNine gave short shrift to the differences, period. Unless he wants to start talking about camshaft specs, valve and port area, he's leaving a huge hole in the information.

RT

 

[ST Gui]

I can kind of see it. If we could just get Ryan to say:

That's the sign post up ahead — the next stop the Twilight Zone.

 

[beemerphile]

Buell was able to get over 100hp, with a warranty, and passing Fed standards, out of the Harley design. Factory Harleys are tuned very mild. It's easy to get more, even if an antiquated design. FortNine gave short shrift to the differences, period. Unless he wants to start talking about camshaft specs, valve and port area, he's leaving a huge hole in the information.

The reason Harleys are sold with no power is the very lucrative Screaming Eagle business that for $4-6,000 will make the engine do what it should have done out of the box. They throw in for free the ability to annoy your neighbors and scare little children. Buell tried to give the customer his money's worth. He got canned for not understanding the Harley corporate ethic that you don't give away something that you can sell.

 

[rwthomas1]

The reason Harleys are sold with no power is the very lucrative Screaming Eagle business that for $4-6,000 will make the engine do what it should have done out of the box. They throw in for free the ability to annoy your neighbors and scare little children. Buell tried to give the customer his money's worth. He got canned for not understanding the Harley corporate ethic that you don't give away something that you can sell.

One of my bosses bikes is a Road King with a bunch of speed parts on it. Goes pretty damned good, but the exhaust is still quiet. Dunno if they are stock pipes or some sort of quiet aftermarket, but its anything but obnoxious. Loud pipes on slow Harleys is de rigueur. Much like huge "fart can" exhausts on bone stock, slammed Honda Civic's. Stupidity knows no bounds.

RT

 

[beemerphile]

One of my bosses bikes is a Road King with a bunch of speed parts on it. Goes pretty damned good, but the exhaust is still quiet.

Your boss is still paying extra to get the bike up to where most bikes start. What other motorcycle manufacturer has a large line of "power parts"? I once saw the service guys at my local Honda/Yamaha/Harley/Suzuki shop prepping a new Ultra for the happy customer. They were driving about a 4 ft. long metal rod up the mufflers with a large hammer. My context for free noise was that I figure the shop did that performance modification "fer nuttin'". One can buy the "speed parts" and leave the exhaust stock. I personally think it is a good sounding machine with stock pipes, but 99.9975% of Harley's customers disagree with me. The fat wallet crowd can add Screaming Eagle "Street Cannons" or "Nightsticks" to their machine to increase its testosterone supplement effect.

Stupidity knows no bounds.

The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits.

 

[Bmacleod]

 

[rwthomas1]

Your boss is still paying extra to get the bike up to where most bikes start. What other motorcycle manufacturer has a large line of "power parts"? I once saw the service guys at my local Honda/Yamaha/Harley/Suzuki shop prepping a new Ultra for the happy customer. They were driving about a 4 ft. long metal rod up the mufflers with a large hammer. My context for free noise was that I figure the shop did that performance modification "fer nuttin'". One can buy the "speed parts" and leave the exhaust stock. I personally think it is a good sounding machine with stock pipes, but 99.9975% of Harley's customers disagree with me. The fat wallet crowd can add Screaming Eagle "Street Cannons" or "Nightsticks" to their machine to increase its testosterone supplement effect.

The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits.

Actually, my boss inherited his Road King. His friend who passed left it to him, so he didn't pay for it, and wouldn't have purchased a Harley. He's got a bunch of Triumph's, the newest being a 96. So I don't class him with the typical HD crowd. Hell, he wears a full face helmet whilst riding it!

RT