"Car engines could soon be fired by lasers instead of spark plugs, researchers say.
A team at the Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics will report on 1 May that they have designed lasers that could ignite the fuel/air mixture in combustion engines."
www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13160950
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Sounds good to me, Spark plugs don't seem to be the problem they maybe once were, but getting rid of coil packs definitely sounds good to me! One less item to service.
Although there's the other view that when it goes wrong you're faced with a much larger bill than for a new coil pack and maybe some plugs.
I think I'd prefer the long term reliability. Might open up new approaches to ignition - multiple "sparks" for more complete combustion every time might be possible? Even if not, might open future development of optics in the combustion chamber - watch the rapid burn and make decisions on the fly based on what's going on at burn time.
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What about using compression ignition and not needing either plugs or lasers?
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>> What about using compression ignition and not needing either plugs or lasers?
That's lined up for the next version of the engine I've got, VAG are calling it Gasoline Compression Ignition, which makes sense but the name others use is HCSI or homogenous compression spark ignition.
It extends on the lean burn mode idea in the current TSi engines - they can only run in this mode ~35% of the time due to NOx emissions. The next version will be able to switch to HCSI mode when cruising under light load, turning off the spark plugs and not needing fancy emissions monitoring (these engines have no pre cat lambda sensor there's some fancy alternative).
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It was an ironic reference to the usual forum response, get a diesel then.
Obviously missed :)
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Lasers could replace spark plugs in car engines - Skoda
