The most powerful of the 16-valve 4A-GE engines, commonly known as the "red top" which produces 100 kW and 140 hp at 6,600 RPM. The next major modification in the engine line up was the high-performance 4A-G, with the fuel injected version, the 4A-GE, being the most powerful. The 4A-GE was one of the earliest inline 4 cylinder engines to have both a DOHC 16 valve configuration and EFi.

The cylinder head was developed by the Yamaha Motor Corp. The reliability and performance of these engines has earned them a fair number of enthusiasts and a fan base as they are a popular choice for an engine swap into other Toyota cars.

The first-generation 4A-GE was introduced in 1983 replaced the 2T-G as Toyota's most popular twincam engine. This engine was identifiable via silver cam covers with the lettering on the upper cover painted black and blue. It was extremely light and strong for a production engine using an all-iron block, weighing in at only 123 kg over a 16% reduction compared to 2T-GEU engine.

The 4A-GE produced 112 hp (84 kW) at 6,600 rpm and 131 N·m of torque at 4,800 rpm. The use of a vane-type air flow meter, which restricted air flow slightly but produced cleaner emissions that was responsible for limited power.

Toyota designed the engine for street performance. The first generation 4A-GE nicknamed the "bigport engine" because it had intake ports of a very large cross sectional area. While the port cross-section was suitably designed for a very highly modified engine at high engine speeds which inevitably caused a considerable drop in low end torque.

The second-generation 4A-GE featured larger diameter bearings for the conrod big ends at 42mm and added four additional reinforcement ribs on the back of the engine block. It is visually similar to the first-generation engine The first- and second-generation engines are very popular with street racers and engine tuners because of their availability, ease of modification, simple design, and lightness of the cylinder block and cylinder head configurations.

The third-generation appeared in 1989. This engine has the silver cam covers with the words only written in red, hence the nickname "red top engine”. Toyota increased the compression ratio from 9.4:1 to 10.3:1 and to correct the air-speed problems of the earlier generations, the intake ports in this cylinder head were re-designed to have a smaller cross-section, and hence it has been nicknamed the "small port cylinder head”. Additional engine modifications to extend life and reliability included under piston cooling oil squirters, thicker more reliable conrods. The pistons were also changed from an 18mm to a 20mm fully floating gudgeon pin. This revision increased the power to 100 kW or 140 hp at 7200 rpm with a torque of 149 N·m of torque at 4800 rpm.

The front wheel drive Corolla was produced and all future Corolla  or Sprinters were based around the FF layout. It should also be noted that all 4A-GE engines including the 20-valve versions featured a forged crankshaft.

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Most devices used in the industrial revolution were referred to as engines. Originally an engine was a mechanical device that converted force into motion. An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert energy into useful mechanical propellant. Internal combustion engines and external combustion engines like such as steam engines burn a source of fuel to create heat which is then used to propel an object. Electric motors convert electrical energy in mechanical motion whilst pneumatic motors use compressed air.

In modern usage, the term is used to describe devices capable of performing mechanical work, hence the word horse power. In most cases the work is produced by exerting a linear force, which is used to operate other machinery which can generate power for various work loads.

An engine or consumes fuel, and is differentiated from an electric machine or electric motor that derives power without changing the composition of matter. A heat engine may also serve as a component that transforms the flow or changes in pressure of a fluid into mechanical energy. An automobile derives its power transformed into motion via the internal combustion engine.

The Watt steam engine was the first type of steam engine to make use of steam at pressure. e term motor was originally used to distinguish the new internal combustion engines from earlier vehicles powered by engines run off steam or steam engines.

The internal combustion engines were first tested in France in 1807 by de Rivaz and independently, by the Niepce brothers . The breakthrough was the invention of the Otto cycle in 1877. The first commercially successful automobile, created by Karl Benz, added to the interest in light and powerful engines. The lightweight petrol internal combustion engine, operating on a four-stroke Otto cycle, has been the most successful for light automobiles.

Continuance of the use of the internal combustion engine for automobiles is partly due to the improvement of ECU or engine control systems. Earlier automobile engine development produced a much larger range of engines than is in common use today. Engines have ranged from 1 to 16 cylinder designs with corresponding differences in overall size, weight, piston displacement, and cylinder bores. Overhead camshafts were frequently employed. Smaller engines types were commonly air-cooled and located at the rear of the vehicle. The 1970s and '80s saw an increased interest in improved fuel economy which brought in a return to smaller V6 and four-cylinder engines, with as many as five valves per cylinder to improve efficiency.

If you are looking for an engine or engine parts Looking 4 Spares is a FREE Parts Locator Service that links you to over 200 Scrap Yards & Parts Suppliers Nationwide.

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Siegfried Samuel Marcus was a German-born Austrian inventor and automobile pioneer. He was the first man who used gasoline for propelling a vehicle in 1870.

He fastened an internal combustion engine on a simple handcart. This appliance was designed for liquid combustibles and made him the first man propelling a vehicle by means of a gasoline propellant. Today this car known as “The Marcus Car”.

In 1883 Marcus was successful in patenting the first low voltage ignition of the magneto type that was given to Siegfried Marcus in Germany. This design was used for all further engine designs and paved the way for the future internal combustion engine.

In 1887, Marcus started a co-operation partnership with Märky, Bromovsky & Schulz. They offered a two stroke engine design and after the fall of the Otto Patent in 1886, four stroke engines of the Marcus type.

In 1888-89 Märky, Bromovsky & Schulz built the “Second Marcus Car”, which can still be admired in Vienna's Technical Museum. This car made Marcus well-known all over the world. Marcus was the holder of 131 patents in over 16 countries. He never applied for a patent for the motorcar and, of course, he never held one. In addition, he never claimed having invented the motorcar. His name was replaced with the names of Daimler and Benz.

Coincidentally, in 1807 Nicephore Niepce installed his 'moss, coal-dust and resin' fueled Pyreolophore internal combustion engine in a boat and powered up the river in France to be granted a patent. The discrete, virtually simultaneous, implementations of these two designs of internal combustion in different modes of transport means that the de Rivaz engine can be correctly described as 'the worlds first use of an internal combustion engine in an auto mobile in 1808.

In 1838 a patent was granted to William Barnet for the first recorded suggestion of in-cylinder compression engine.

In 1856 Pietro Benini realized a working prototype of the Italian engine supplying 5HP. In subsequent years he developed more powerful engines with one and two pistons, which served as steady power sources, replacing steam engines.

In 1878 Dugald Clerk designed the first two-stroke engine which he patented it in England in 1881.

In 1885 engineer Gottlieb Daiml received a German patent for a supercharger.

In 1896 Karl Benz invented the boxer engine, also known as the horizontally opposed engine, or the flat engine, in which the corresponding pistons reach top dead center at the same time, thus balancing each other in momentum.

In 1905 Alfred Buchi manages to patent the turbocharger and starts producing the first examples.

In 1926 Robert Goddard launches the first liquid fueled rocket

In 1954 Felix Wankel produces the first working prototype DKM 54 of the Wankel Rotary Engine.

Although various forms of internal combustion engines were developed before the 19th century, their use was hindered until the commercial drilling and production of petroleum began in the 1850’s. By the late 19th century, engineering advances led to their widespread adoption in a variety of applications.

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There are several types of plating that have been used over the years. Plating was generally only a few thousands of an inch thick. In the early seventies Electrofusion became popular. Next came ceramic composites and Boron and then came the product Nikasil. Nikasil was the new plating formula of nickel-silicon-carbide for the eighties and later nineties. Today you can choose from companies around the world doing 'their own' version of Nikasil. In South Africa there is probably only one company that can assist with the process at more than twice the cost of any other other replacement piston sleeve processes on the market today.

Nikasil sleeve coatings have been lost within 5000 km use with the wrong viscosity oil. The drained oil looked like aluminum paint. Special rings are needed so the nikasil coating is not scraped off like thin ice on a window and more than ever you must have 100% faith in the underlying process of the Nikasil company that you are dealing with.  

Compared to the trusted and proven re-sleeving process, that now is backed by exciting and well proven products and honing techniques, a new product was developed by Kolbenschmidt and BMW and the alloy composite 'Alusil' was born. Alusil is hypereutectic aluminium-slicon alloy. Alusil is not a coating process but a treatment of the aluminium surface through a honing and lapping process and chemical etching that exposes an extremely hard silicon precipitate namely ‘silica’, thus rendering  the abundant silicon particles on the aluminum surface that act as a well suited wear layer for most engine types as used by BMW, Porsche and many other vehicle and motorcycle manufacturers and engineers today as a first choice of sleeve material. So how reliable is cylinder plating?

Re-Plated NIKASIL Cylinders

Pros

• Only small advantage in heat transfer
• Somewhat lower co-efficient of friction
• Weighs only a few ounces less

Cons

• Costs twice the price of any other process
• Cannot be bored when damaged
• Sulfur in fuel corodes Nikasil plating
• Can crack, flake and peel off
• More fragile than other sleeve materials
• No Guarantees

 Re-Sleeved Cylinders and ALUSIL

Pros

• Costs half the price of Nikasil plating
• Cast iron, Chrome Molly, Alusil can be used
• Alusil has excellent lubricating qualities
• Alusil is light weight and wears well
• All can be re-bored to next oversize
• Honing keep bores true and seals rings
• Can be worked with common tools
• Easily replaced as necessarry
• Guaranteed

 Cons

• Slightly slower heat transfer

Is Nikasil a dying process with the negatives outweighing the positives? By the year 2000 improved materials and new cylinder techniques had become readily available. These new age materials that have been developed and introduced into motor engineering circles have been been put to the test over the last decade or so through the ‘trial and error’ method of elimination over time and has shown Nikasil to be an inferior material for engine sleeves.

In 1997 BMW stopped all Nikasil engine block production and introduced the much desired new all-in-one sand cast Alusil engine blocks and sleeves that have been in production since. Nikasil was replaced for exactly the reasons as set out above.

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