[seabird]

You can't just make the Traxxas 18x bigger and get linear performance improvement. Trying to compare power/weight between engines with radically different weight constraints is silly.

[93po]

Ok, a Kawasaki H2R engine makes 326 horsepower and weighs about 160 pounds running regular fuel. That's almost identical to the Traxxas - 1hp for 0.49 pounds.

[seabird]

That engine is 4x heavier and supercharged. You're not comparing apples to apples.

[93po]

my point is that this ratio exists both much smaller and also somewhat larger. it makes sense this same ratio would be possible in the middle of the two as well. also diesels have super/turbo chargers all the time on production engines, why is that cheating?

[syrrim]

If you had 18 such engines it would get you precisely 18x the performance, at precisely 18x the weight.

[Retric]

No, because you would need to add structural elements, some way of combining power output, and cooling if you’re aiming for a similar form factor.

[seabird]

That's why there's all sorts of widely produced performance vehicles with multiple independent engines!

[aidenn0]

And precisely 1/18 the MTBF

[93po]

In a way, sure. Often when a car engine fails people just replace it. If you were to replace all 18 when the first one failed, the same way you would with a regular car engine, it's not 1/18 the MTBF. And if it was just 1 failing prematurely and you replaced only that one, you also see that same dynamic with car engines when a single component of it fails that's worth fixing.

[pas]

but it fails gracefully, right? (only one engine fails at a time)

it's like RAID, great until the RAID card itself fails

[aidenn0]

It's probably most like losing power in a single cylinder; the effects vary from engine to engine.

[jacquesm]

They tend to seize and when they do and you gang them they'll likely break stuff in the other ones unless you add a freewheel or some other luxury like that.