Stirling Engine Design and Machining
The goal of this project is to make a heat engine that can convert heat energy into rotational kinetic energy of the flywheel. Both creativity in design and machining skill are necessary to complete a beautiful and effective engine.
Check out a video of the engine's maiden voyage to the right!
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To build this engine, I used 3-axis mills and manual lathes. The engine is built mostly out of aluminum, with some high-stress parts in steel and some high-friction parts in brass.
By building this engine, I not only learned how to efficiently complete these parts, but also learned the design principles needed for hand-manufactured metal parts.
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To the left, check out the top assembly of my stirling engine, rendered in SOLIDWORKS.
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Throughout the 2024 Fall semester, I will update this page as I manufacture more parts of this engine. So far I've finished all parts except for the wooden base.
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Machining demands excruciating precision. See some videos of me precision machining of complex parts below!
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I hope to keep this engine as a display piece for many years, so I'm going to great lengths to make sure that the tolerancing is perfected and the parts are nicely polished.
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This effort has also been a great opportunity to hone the GD&T skills I learned during my internship at Tesla!
Milling aluminum 6061 T6 mounting block island feature with MasterCAM
Milling brass piston flange using custom fixture
Finished Mounting Block
Mounting Block Engineering Drawing