Chevrolet 2300 Engine
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The 2300 is a
inline-four engine A straight-four engine (also called an inline-four) is a four-cylinder piston engine where cylinders are arranged in a line along a common crankshaft. The vast majority of automotive four-cylinder engines use a straight-four layout (with the ...
produced by the
Chevrolet Chevrolet ( ), colloquially referred to as Chevy and formally the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors Company, is an American automobile division of the American manufacturer General Motors (GM). Louis Chevrolet (1878–1941) and ous ...
division of
General Motors The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...
for the 1971 to 1977 model years of the
Chevrolet Vega The Chevrolet Vega is a Subcompact car, subcompact automobile that was manufactured and marketed by General Motors, GM's Chevrolet subdivision from 1970 to 1977. Available in two-door hatchback, notchback, station wagon, wagon, and sedan deliver ...
and
Chevrolet Monza The Chevrolet Monza is a subcompact automobile produced by Chevrolet for the 1975 through 1980 model years. The Monza is based on the Chevrolet Vega, sharing its wheelbase, width, and standard inline-four engine. The car was designed to accommoda ...
. It featured a die-cast
aluminum alloy An aluminium alloy (or aluminum alloy; see spelling differences) is an alloy in which aluminium (Al) is the predominant metal. The typical alloying elements are copper, magnesium, manganese, silicon, tin, nickel and zinc. There are two principal ...
cylinder block In an internal combustion engine, the engine block is the structure which contains the cylinders and other components. In an early automotive engine, the engine block consisted of just the cylinder block, to which a separate crankcase was attac ...
. The high-tech block features an alloy with 17 percent
silicon Silicon is a chemical element with the symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic luster, and is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor. It is a member of group 14 in the periodic tab ...
. During the machining process, the cylinders were etched leaving the pure silicon particles exposed providing the piston wear surface, eliminating the need for iron cylinder liners. The block has cast iron main caps and a cast iron
crankshaft A crankshaft is a mechanical component used in a piston engine to convert the reciprocating motion into rotational motion. The crankshaft is a rotating shaft containing one or more crankpins, that are driven by the pistons via the connecting ...
. The engine's
cylinder head In an internal combustion engine, the cylinder head (often abbreviated to simply "head") sits above the cylinders and forms the roof of the combustion chamber. In sidevalve engines, the head is a simple sheet of metal; whereas in more modern ov ...
is cast iron for lower cost, structural integrity and longer
camshaft A camshaft is a shaft that contains a row of pointed cams, in order to convert rotational motion to reciprocating motion. Camshafts are used in piston engines (to operate the intake and exhaust valves), mechanically controlled ignition systems ...
bearing life. The valvetrain features a direct-acting
single overhead camshaft An overhead camshaft (OHC) engine is a piston engine where the camshaft is located in the cylinder head above the combustion chamber. This contrasts with earlier overhead valve engines (OHV), where the camshaft is located below the combustion cha ...
design.(2005) Weird GM Engines
retrieved on 18 December 2008. The engine block and cylinder heads were cast at
Massena Castings Plant Massena Castings Plant (also known as the Central Foundry Division) was a General Motors aluminium casting (metalworking), casting foundry located in Massena, New York. The plant utilized the die casting and lost-foam casting processes, operating f ...
in
Massena, New York Massena is a town in St. Lawrence County, New York, United States. Massena is along the county's northern border, just south of the St. Lawrence River and the Three Nations Crossing of the Canada–United States border. The population was 12,8 ...
.


Overview

The tall, long-stroke motor's vibration tendencies are helped by large rubber engine mounts. One- and two-barrel carburated versions were offered. The two-barrel version, the L11 option, also included a revised camshaft for a power increase of . The engine used a bore x stroke and 8.0:1 compression. Overheating was a serious concern for the engine, since the engine block was of an open-deck design, severe overheating could cause the cylinder barrels to warp and pull away from the head gasket, causing coolant leaks into the cylinders and cylinder scuffing. Maintaining oil and coolant levels was crucial for the engine. The engine was equipped with an oil pressure switch which grounds out the primary-ignition system should the oil pressure fall below during operation, thus stopping and preventing the engine from being restarted until the oil level was replenished or the mechanical cause of low-oil pressure was remedied. Chevrolet dealers installed a coolant-recovery tank, a low-coolant warning light and extended Vega's engine warranty to . The 1976 to 1977 the engine received a new cylinder-head design, incorporating hydraulic lifters to replace the taper-screw valve adjusters, improved coolant pathways, longer-life valve-stem seals, a redesigned water pump and thermostat, and a five-year, engine warranty. The engine's name was changed to Dura-Built 140. 1975 to 1976
Pontiac Astre The Pontiac Astre is a subcompact automobile that was marketed by Pontiac as a rebadged variant of the Chevrolet Vega. Initially marketed in Canada for model years 1973–1974, the Astre debuted in the U.S. for the 1975 model year, competing with ...
and 1975 to 1977
Chevrolet Monza The Chevrolet Monza is a subcompact automobile produced by Chevrolet for the 1975 through 1980 model years. The Monza is based on the Chevrolet Vega, sharing its wheelbase, width, and standard inline-four engine. The car was designed to accommoda ...
had the Vega engine as standard equipment. Monza's
H-body The H Platform, or H-body, name has been used twice by General Motors. The 1970s H-body was an inexpensive rear-wheel drive compact automobile platform from the 1970s, used for the Chevrolet Vega and Monza and their Buick, Oldsmobile, and Pontiac d ...
variants, the
Pontiac Sunbird The Pontiac Sunbird (also known as the Pontiac J2000 and Pontiac 2000) is a model line that was manufactured and marketed by Pontiac from the 1976 to the 1994 model years. Loosely deriving its name from the Pontiac Firebird, the Sunbird was intr ...
and
Oldsmobile Starfire The Oldsmobile Starfire is an automobile nameplate used by Oldsmobile, produced in three non-contiguous generations beginning in 1954. The Starfire nameplate made its debut as a convertible concept car in 1953 followed with the 1954–1956 Nine ...
adopted Vega's revised Dura-built 140 engine, for 1976 and 1977 respectively. The
Cosworth Cosworth is a British automotive engineering company founded in London in 1958, specialising in high-performance internal combustion engines, powertrain, and electronics for automobile racing (motorsport) and mainstream automotive industrie ...
Vega engine was produced in 1975 and 1976 using the 2300 engine block. The engine was de-stroked to giving , with a 16-valve aluminum cylinder head, double overhead cams (
DOHC An overhead camshaft (OHC) engine is a piston engine where the camshaft is located in the cylinder head above the combustion chamber. This contrasts with earlier overhead valve engines (OHV), where the camshaft is located below the combustion c ...
),
forged Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die. Forging is often classified according to the temperature at which it ...
components and solid lifters. It produced and .


Aluminum engine block

GM Research Labs had been working on a sleeveless aluminum block since the late '50s. The incentive was cost. Engineering out the four-cylinder's block liners would save $8 per unit — a substantial amount of money at the time. Reynolds Metal Co. developed a
hypereutectic A eutectic system or eutectic mixture ( ) is a homogeneous mixture that has a melting point lower than those of the constituents. The lowest possible melting point over all of the mixing ratios of the constituents is called the ''eutectic tempe ...
aluminum alloy called A-390, composed of 77 percent aluminum, 17 percent
silicon Silicon is a chemical element with the symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic luster, and is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor. It is a member of group 14 in the periodic tab ...
, 4 percent
copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...
, 1 percent
iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in f ...
, and traces of
phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Ear ...
,
zinc Zinc is a chemical element with the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. Zinc is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodi ...
,
manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...
, and
titanium Titanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ti and atomic number 22. Found in nature only as an oxide, it can be reduced to produce a lustrous transition metal with a silver color, low density, and high strength, resistant to corrosion in ...
. The A-390 alloy was suitable for faster production diecasting which made the Vega block less expensive to manufacture than other aluminum engines. Sealed Power Corp. developed special chrome-plated
piston rings A piston ring is a metallic split ring that is attached to the outer diameter of a piston in an internal combustion engine or steam engine. The main functions of piston rings in engines are: # Sealing the combustion chamber so that there is mini ...
for the engine that were blunted to prevent scuffing. Basic work had been done under Eudell Jackobson of GM engineering, but final production engineering work was finished by Chevrolet. The Vega engine block was cast in
Massena, New York Massena is a town in St. Lawrence County, New York, United States. Massena is along the county's northern border, just south of the St. Lawrence River and the Three Nations Crossing of the Canada–United States border. The population was 12,8 ...
, at the same factory that had produced the
Chevrolet Turbo-Air 6 engine The Chevrolet Turbo-Air 6 is a flat-six air-cooled automobile engine developed by General Motors (GM) in the late 1950s for use in the rear-engined Chevrolet Corvair of the 1960s. It was used in the entire Corvair line, as well as a wide variety ...
for the Corvair. Molten aluminum was transported from Reynolds and
Alcoa Alcoa Corporation (an acronym for Aluminum Company of America) is a Pittsburgh-based industrial corporation. It is the world's eighth-largest producer of aluminum. Alcoa conducts operations in 10 countries. Alcoa is a major producer of primary ...
reduction plants to the foundry, inside Thermos-like insulated tank trailers from the factory across the street. The block was cast using the ACCURAD process. The casting process provided a uniform distribution of fine primary silicon particles approximately in size. Pure silicon provides a hard scuff and wear resistant surface, having a rating of 7 on the
mohs scale The Mohs scale of mineral hardness () is a qualitative ordinal scale, from 1 to 10, characterizing scratch resistance of various minerals through the ability of harder material to scratch softer material. The scale was introduced in 1812 by th ...
of hardness, the same as
quartz Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica (silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon-oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical form ...
, as compared to
diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Another solid form of carbon known as graphite is the Chemical stability, chemically stable form of car ...
which is 10. The blocks were aged 8 hours at to achieve dimensional stability. The technical breakthroughs of the block lay in the precision die-casting method used to produce it, and in the silicon alloying which provided a compatible bore surface without liners. Before being shipped to Tonawanda, the blocks were impregnated with
sodium silicate Sodium silicate is a generic name for chemical compounds with the formula or ·, such as sodium metasilicate , sodium orthosilicate , and sodium pyrosilicate . The anions are often polymeric. These compounds are generally colorless transparent ...
, where they were machined through the outer skin.Collectable Automobile-April 2000 From Massena, the cast engine blocks were shipped as raw castings to Chevy's
Tonawanda Engine Tonawanda Engine is a General Motors engine factory in Buffalo, New York. The plant consists of three facilities totaling and sits upon . The factory receives cast engine blocks from Defiance Foundry in Defiance, Ohio and Saginaw Metal Casting Op ...
plant in
Tonawanda, New York Tonawanda (formally ''City of Tonawanda'') is a city in Erie County, New York, United States. The population was 15,130 at the 2010 census. It is at the northern edge of Erie County, south across the Erie Canal (Tonawanda Creek) from North Ton ...
. Here they underwent the messy etch and machining operations. The cylinder bores were rough and finish-honed conventionally to a finish then etched by a then-new electro-chemical process. The etching removed approximately of aluminum leaving the pure silicon particles prominent to form the bore surface. With a finished weight of , the block weighs less than the cast-iron block in the
Chevy II The Chevrolet Chevy II/Nova is a small automobile manufactured by Chevrolet, and produced in five generations for the 1962 through 1979, and 1985 through 1988 model years. Nova was the top model in the Chevy II lineup through 1968. The Chevy II ...
inline-4. Plating the
piston A piston is a component of reciprocating engines, reciprocating pumps, gas compressors, hydraulic cylinders and pneumatic cylinders, among other similar mechanisms. It is the moving component that is contained by a cylinder and is made gas-tig ...
skirts was necessary to put a hard iron skirt surface opposite the silicon of the block to prevent scuffing. The plating was a four layer electro-plating process. The first plate was a flash of zinc followed by a very thin flash of copper. The third and primary coating was hard iron, thick. The final layer was a flash of tin. The zinc and copper were necessary to adhere the iron while the tin prevented corrosion before assembly of the piston into the engine. Piston plating was done on a 46 operation automatic line. From Tonawanda, the engines went to the Chevrolet assembly plant in
Lordstown, Ohio Lordstown is a village in southern Trumbull County, Ohio, United States. The population was 3,332 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Youngstown–Warren metropolitan area. Lordstown is best known as the home of the Lordstown Assembly, a Ge ...
. Eudell Jackobson of GM engineering pointed out one of the early problems with unexplained scuffing and discovered excessive pressure on the bore hones was causing the silicon to crack. This need to both develop and actually manufacture the engine was a product of the program schedule. He said, "...We were trying to put a product into production and learning the technology simultaneously. And the pressure becomes very, very great when that happens. The hone-pressure problem was solved before engines actually went out the door, affecting pre-production engines only."


See also

*
GM engines This list of GM engines encompasses all engines manufactured by General Motors and used in their cars. Divisions When General Motors was created in 1908, it started out with Buick and soon after acquired Oldsmobile, Cadillac and Oakland. There we ...


References

{{Reflist Chevrolet engines Straight-four engines Gasoline engines by model