Mason Slingluff

Professor Jizi
UWRT 1103
3 November 3, 2015
Research Proposal
1. How does a Motorcycles camshaft design effect its performance?
2. Explore: What parts of a camshaft influence its ability to rev to high speeds? What
durations do most motorcycle camshaft lobes use? Do dual overhead camshaft setups
make it easier for an engine to rev higher?
Argue: The camshaft setup in a motorcycle is one of the main reasons most motorcycle
engines rev relatively high.
3. I know that in high displacement engines the camshaft setup can change the torque curve
quiet drastically. But because I have never studied engines that rev over six or seven
thousand RPMs I have no clue on how a camshaft will affect an engines performance at
very high RPMs. I also know that camshaft lobe overlap plays a role in an engines
ability to idle. I want to know if a motorcycle uses Variable Valve Timing(VVT) to adjust
the camshaft overlap at low RPMs to maintain a stable idle or does the motorcycle engine
not use VVT and just has very minimal overlap.