Patent Grant
11802498
The present invention generally relates to oil distribution systems of engines. The invention particularly relates to oil distribution blocks suitable for attachment to front and rear cylinder heads of engines, including motorcycle engines, that provide for threaded coupling to removable oil distribution lines.
The Harley-Davidson® M8 engine was first introduced in 2016 (i.e., certain 2017 models) and represented the ninth generation of Harley-Davidson®'s “big twin” engines. The M8 engine is currently available in 107 cu in (1,750 cc), 114 cu in (1,870 cc), and 117 cu in (1,920 cc) versions. All of the versions of the M8 engine include two cylinders with four valves per cylinder for a total of eight valves in a traditional V-twin configuration with cylinders oriented at 45 degrees to each other.
The M8 engine includes a combination air-cooled and oil-cooled system to cool the engine's front and rear cylinder heads. In the oil system, oil is drawn from the engine's oil pan by a pump and pumped through an engine-to-oil cooler hose to an oil cooler located at the front of the engine, where the heat of the oil is exchanged with air that surrounds the oil cooler and flows through the oil cooler while the motorcycle is moving. From the oil cooler, the oil flows through an oil cooler-to-downtube hose to a downtube. From the downtube, the oil flows through a supply oil line where the oil splits into two separate flow paths and travels to front and rear manifolds of the engine's front and rear cylinder heads, respectively. For convenience, portions of the supply oil line downstream of the split are referred to herein as front and rear cylinder head feed lines. Within the front and rear cylinder heads, the oil flows through cooling passages that route the oil between the exhaust valve seats for cooling these critical areas of the engine. The oil is then routed back through the manifolds. Oil exiting the front manifold flows through a return oil line and enters the rear manifold at which point the oil from the two separate flow paths recombine. The recombined oil then exits the rear manifold and flows through a rear oil hose to be returned to the oil pan.
The front and rear manifolds each include a rigid block body bolted to the front and rear cylinder heads, respectively. The supply oil line and the return oil line are formed of rigid materials (e.g., “hard lines”) fixed to respective inlets and outlets of the front and rear manifolds. Therefore, the supply oil line and the return oil line are not intended to be easily disconnected from the front and rear manifolds, especially by end consumers. However, it can be appreciated that it would be desirable if the supply oil line and/or the return oil line could be removed in order to promote ease of maintenance.
The intent of this section of the specification is to briefly indicate the nature and substance of the invention, as opposed to an exhaustive statement of all subject matter and aspects of the invention. Therefore, while this section identifies subject matter recited in the claims, additional subject matter and aspects relating to the invention are set forth in other sections of the specification, particularly the detailed description, as well as any drawings.
The present invention provides oil distribution blocks and oil distribution systems comprising the same. The oil distribution blocks are configured for easy removal of supply oil lines, return oil lines, and/or rear oil hoses in order to promote ease of maintenance of an engine, for example, a motorcycle engine.
According to a nonlimiting aspect of the invention, an oil distribution block is provided that includes a rigid block body configured to be secured to a cylinder head of an engine, an oil inlet configured to be releasably coupled to a first oil distribution line or a fitting therebetween, receive a flow of oil therefrom, and route the oil to an inlet of a cooling passage of the cylinder head, and an oil outlet configured to be releasably coupled to a second oil distribution line or a fitting therebetween, receive the flow of oil from an outlet of the cooling passage of the cylinder head, and route the oil to the second oil distribution line. The oil inlet and the oil outlet are configured to threadably couple with the first and second oil distribution lines, respectively, or the fittings therebetween.
According to another nonlimiting aspect of the invention, an external oil distribution system is provided for directing a flow of oil to and from cooling passages of front and rear cylinder heads of a motorcycle engine, for example, a Harley-Davidson® M8 engine. The external oil distribution system includes front and rear cylinder head feed lines configured to transport oil to the cooling passages of the front and rear cylinder heads, respectively, a Tee fitting configured to receive and combine the oil from the cooling passages of the front and rear cylinder heads, a return oil line configured to transport the oil from the cooling passage of the front cylinder head to the Tee fitting, a rear oil hose configured to receive the oil from the Tee fitting, and front and rear oil distribution blocks. The front oil distribution block includes a rigid block body configured to be secured to the front cylinder head, an oil inlet configured to be releasably coupled to the front cylinder head feed line or a fitting therebetween, receive the oil therefrom, and route the oil to an inlet of the cooling passage of the front cylinder head, and an oil outlet configured to be releasably coupled to the return oil line or a fitting therebetween, receive the oil from an outlet of the cooling passage of the front cylinder head, and route the oil to the return oil line. The rear oil distribution block includes a rigid block body configured to be secured to the rear cylinder head, an oil inlet configured to be releasably coupled to the rear cylinder head feed line or a fitting therebetween, receive the oil therefrom, and route the oil to an inlet of the cooling passage of the rear cylinder head, and an oil outlet configured to be releasably coupled to the Tee fitting, receive the oil from an outlet of the cooling passage of the rear cylinder head, and route the oil to the Tee fitting. The oil inlet and the oil outlet of both of the front and rear oil distribution blocks include threads configured to threadably couple with one or more of the front and rear cylinder head feed lines, the Tee fitting, the return oil line, the rear oil hose, or the fittings therebetween.
Other nonlimiting aspects of the invention include a method of modifying a factory standard oil distribution system of a motorcycle engine, for example, a Harley-Davidson® M8 engine, with the external oil distribution system described above and a kit comprising a pair of oil distribution blocks of the type described above.
Technical effects of oil distribution blocks and oil distribution systems as described above preferably include the ability to be attached to front and rear cylinder heads of engines that provide for threaded coupling to removable oil distribution lines, as a nonlimiting example, motorcycle engines such as the Milwaukee-Eight® (M8) engine commercially available from Harley-Davidson, Inc. The oil distribution blocks and oil distribution systems are preferably able to promote the ease with which supply oil lines (i.e., the front and rear cylinder head feed lines), return oil lines, and/or rear oil hoses can be removed to promote ease of maintenance.
Other aspects and advantages of this invention will be appreciated from the following detailed description.
The intended purpose of the following detailed description of the invention and the phraseology and terminology employed therein is to describe what is shown in the drawings, which include the depiction of nonlimiting embodiments of the invention, and to describe certain but not all aspects of the embodiment(s). The following detailed description also identifies certain but not all alternatives of the embodiment(s). Therefore, the appended claims, and not the detailed description, are intended to particularly point out subject matter regarded to be aspects of the invention, including certain but not necessarily all of the aspects and alternatives described in the detailed description.
The front oil distribution block 100 is represented in
The block body 102 includes a pair of mounting holes 104 having axes that are depicted as roughly perpendicular to the outer face 103A of the block body 102. The mounting holes 204 are configured to receive fasteners (not shown) for securing the block body 102 to the front cylinder head 300. The block body 102 is also represented as having recesses 106 that encircle the mounting holes 104 at the outer face 103A in order to receive part if not the entire head of each fastener.
The block body 102 comprises an oil inlet 108 having a first opening 108A located on the outer face 103A adjacent an upper end of the block body 102, a second opening 108B located on the inner face 103B of the block body 102, and a passage 108C within the block body 102 that fluidically connects the first and second openings 108A and 108B of the oil inlet 108. The block body 102 also comprises an oil outlet 110 having a first opening 110A located on the sidewall 105 adjacent a lower end of the block body 102, a second opening 1108 located on the inner face 103B of the block body 102, and a passage 110C within the block body 102 that fluidically connects the first and second openings 110A and 1108 of the oil outlet 110. The second openings 108B and 1108 on the inner face 103B of the block body 102 are surrounded by collars 108D and 110D, respectively, that facilitate the connection and sealing of the front oil distribution block 100 to the front cylinder head 300.
The oil inlet 108 is configured to couple with a front cylinder head feed line 306 or a fitting therebetween (e.g., elbow fitting 310) and fluidically connect the front cylinder head feed line 306 with an inlet of the cooling passage that is routed through the front cylinder head 300 of the engine. Similarly, the oil outlet 110 is configured to couple with a return oil line 312 or a fitting therebetween (e.g., a tube 316 with fittings) and fluidically connect the return oil line 312 with an outlet of the cooling passage of the front cylinder head 300.
The first opening 108A of the oil inlet 108 and the first opening 110A of the oil outlet 110 located on the outer face 103A of the block body 102 may be configured to threadably mate with the front cylinder head feed line 306 and the return oil line 312, respectively, or threaded fittings therebetween. For examples in which the first opening 108A and the first opening 110A include female threaded connections, the first openings 108A and 110A may include threads on inner walls thereof, may be encircled by recesses having threads on inner walls thereof, or may be encircled by fittings that protrude from the outer face 103A and have threads on inner walls thereof.
The rear oil distribution block 200 is represented in
The block body 202 includes a pair of mounting holes 204 having axes that are depicted as roughly perpendicular to the outer face 203A. The mounting holes 204 are configured to receive fasteners (not shown) for securing the block body 202 to the rear cylinder head 302. The block body 202 is also represented as having recesses 206 that encircle the mounting holes 204 at the outer face 203A in order to receive part if not the entire head of each fastener.
The block body 202 comprises an oil inlet 208 having a first opening 208A located on the outer face 203A of the block body 202 adjacent an upper end of the block body 202, a second opening 208B located on the inner face 203B of the block body 202, and a passage 208C within the block body 202 therebetween that fluidically connects the first and second openings 208A and 208B of the oil inlet 208. The block body 102 also comprises an oil outlet 210 having a first opening 210A located on the outer face 203A adjacent a lower end of the block body 202, a second opening 210B located on the inner face 203B of the block body 202, and a passage 210C within the block body 102 that fluidically connects the first and second openings 210A and 210B of the oil outlet 210. The openings 208B, 210A, and 210B are surrounded by collars 208D, 2110E, and 210D, respectively, that facilitate the connection and sealing of the front oil distribution block 100 to the front cylinder head 300 and a Tee fitting 322 (discussed below).
The oil inlet 208 is configured to couple with the rear cylinder head feed line 324 or a fitting therebetween (e.g., elbow fitting 328) and fluidically connect the rear cylinder head feed line 324 with an inlet of the cooling passage that is routed through the rear cylinder head 302 of the engine. The oil outlet 210 is configured to couple with the Tee fitting 322, which recombines the oil from an outlet of the cooling passage flowing through the rear oil distribution block 200 and the oil flowing from the return oil line 312 and fluidically connects the combined oil flow to a rear oil line 330.
The first openings 208A and 210A of the oil inlet 208 and oil outlet 210 may be configured to threadably mate with the rear cylinder head feed line 324 and the Tee fitting 322, respectively, or threaded fittings therebetween. For examples in which the first openings 208A and 210A include female threaded connections, the first openings 208A and 210A may include threads on inner walls thereof, may be encircled by recesses having threads on inner walls thereof, or may be encircled by fittings that protrude from the outer face 203A having threads on inner walls thereof.
In certain cases, the external oil distribution system represented in
Once these components have been removed, the front oil distribution block 100 may be secured to the front cylinder head 300 at the first location and the rear oil distribution block 200 may be secured to the rear cylinder head 302 at the second location. Optionally, the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 may be secured with original, factory standard mounting bolts that were previously used to secure the front and rear manifolds. Once secured, the front and rear cylinder head feed lines 306 and 324 may be threadably coupled to the oil inlets 108 and 208 of the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200, respectively, directly or via the fittings therebetween, the return oil line 312 and the Tee fitting 322 may each be threadably coupled to the oil outlets 110 and 210 of the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200, respectively, directly or via the fittings therebetween, and the return oil line 312 and the rear oil line 330 may each be threadably coupled to the Tee fitting 322 directly or via the fittings therebetween.
Once the components of the replacement external oil distribution system have been assembled as described above, they may be connected to the remainder of the original oil distribution system of the M8 engine. This may include fluidically connecting the front and rear cylinder head feed lines 306 and 324 to a downtube that is fluidically coupled to an oil cooler, and/or fluidically connecting the rear oil line 330 to an oil pan.
In view of the above, the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 allow for easy removal of the oil distribution lines that are connected to the front and rear cylinder heads 300 and 302. In certain cases, the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 may be components of a kit that includes flexible, braided oil distribution lines (e.g., the front and rear cylinder head feed lines 306 and 324, the return oil line 312, and/or the rear oil line 330) and corresponding fittings that in combination are configured to replace the factory standard front and rear manifolds and hard line and/or other oil distribution lines provided with the Harley-Davidson® M8 engine. Such configurations may promote ease of maintenance of the exterior oil distribution system, especially by end users. In addition, various components of the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200, the oil distribution lines, and/or the fittings therebetween may be configured to provide aesthetic modifications to the engine. For example, such components may include various colored coatings that provide a consistent or otherwise aesthetically pleasing appearance.
As previously noted above, though the foregoing detailed description describes certain aspects of one or more particular embodiments of the invention, alternatives could be adopted by one skilled in the art. For example, the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 could differ in appearance and construction from the embodiment described herein and shown in the figures, functions of certain components of the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 could be performed by components of different construction but capable of a similar (though not necessarily equivalent) function, and various materials could be used in the fabrication of the front and rear oil distribution blocks 100 and 200 and/or their components. As such, and again as was previously noted, it should be understood that the invention is not necessarily limited to any embodiment described herein or illustrated in the drawings.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 63/292,477 filed Dec. 22, 2021, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4392464 | Woodward et al. | Jul 1983 | A |
| 8887688 | Neal | Nov 2014 | B1 |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20230193794 A1 | Jun 2023 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 63292477 | Dec 2021 | US |
