Hack Your Engine Virtually

It is no secret that we like simulating circuits before we build something and there are plenty of great tools for that. But what about those of us who work on cars? Well, you might try engine-sim which is a real-time internal combustion engine simulation. Honestly, the program freely admits that it isn’t accurate enough to do engineering or engine tuning. But on the plus side, it has audio output and is at least good as an educational tool to show an engine running and how different parameters might affect it. You can see a video of the tool below.

[Ange-Yaghi] mentions that the code was primarily to power the YoutTube demo. However, the Readme hints that it might be better — or at least different — and collaboration to make it better is welcome.

  We know firsthand that a simulator doesn’t have to be totally accurate to give you a feel for how things work. After all, most simulations for electronics don’t always model things like wire resistance and parasitic effects. We’ll leave it to the more engine savvy to tell us if this simulator is close enough to be useful.

The keyboard commands let you toggle the ignition, change gearing using a clutch, and change the throttle. We’d love to see a screen of data like this for our actual car engine and maybe using one of those Bluetooth dongles, you could get close.

We remember a clock that was also an engine simulator, of sorts. If your simulation dreams center more on electronics, there are plenty of choices there.