Last week we shared with you the A38 AMG with "dual engine" blessing. After installing an additional 1.9-liter inline four-cylinder engine in the tail compartment, the car looked like an ordinary first-generation car at the time. The experimental product, which was not much different from the A-class car, had an output of 250 horsepower and four-wheel drive attributes. Its 0-100km/h acceleration time of 5.7 seconds was comparable to many sports cars at the time.
Of course, this dual-engine solution to increase power is not a patent of AMG. In fact, as early as the early 20th century when engine technology was not developed, the dual-engine design was proven to be an effective way to improve vehicle performance. performance approach. In the following decades, many car manufacturers also tried to create models equipped with two engines. Although most of them were not launched on the market like the A38 AMG, they did become unique in the car world... …
Due to the defeat to Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union in the 1934 Grand Prix, the then Alfa Romeo team manager Enzo Ferrari and racing designer Luigi Bazzi decided to Create a racing car based on the P3 chassis and with a dual-engine design to defeat the opponent, and Bimotore was born.
At that time, Alfa Romeo built two Bimotores. One was equipped with two 2.9-liter engines, and the other was equipped with two 3.2-liter engines. The power of the two engines on the car was passed through their respective The transmission mechanism is uniformly transmitted to the rear axle. This design did effectively improve the power of the car, but the overly complex design made maintenance difficult, and the extra fuel consumption and tire wear caused by the dual engines also made the pit stop maintenance time further longer, so Bimotore failed in the end. Won the championship in the 1935 competition. Soon after, it was replaced by the Tipo C racing car.
Although the dual-engine Bimotore failed to prove itself on the court, it can indeed run very fast. On June 16, 1935, Nuvolari drove this specially modified Bimotore to a speed record of 364km/h, and the average speed reached 323km/h.
As you can probably guess by looking at the name, the Citroen 2CV Sahara is a derivative version created to improve the off-road capabilities of the 2CV. It was originally intended to be supplied to France's African colonies. Logically speaking, if you want to improve off-road performance, you may just install a four-wheel drive system; but unfortunately, the power of the ordinary 2CV is too weak, so without increasing power, it is even more impossible to improve off-road performance.
As a result, Citro?n’s solution was to install a 12-horsepower 425cc twin-cylinder engine directly into the rear of the 2CV Sahara to drive the rear wheels. In this way, the 2CV not only doubled the power, but also had four-wheel drive capability. . With the same output of the two engines, the top speed of the 2CV Sahara can reach 105km/h. In addition, possibly due to the need to save fuel, the rear engine of the 2CV Sahara is also equipped with an independent start switch, so that it can be driven with a single engine when not needed.
Because its performance has been significantly improved compared to the 2CV, and it also has certain off-road capabilities, the 2CV Sahara has been favored by many off-road enthusiasts. From the start of production in 1958 to the discontinuation of production in 1971, Citro?n produced 694 2CV Saharas in a row; this car is also highly collectible at present, and the estimated price of a properly restored 2CV Sahara can reach 70,000 pounds.
The Saab 93 Monstret is an experimental model built by Saab in 1959 based on the then Saab 93. In order to make the vehicle more powerful, Saab engineers came up with the idea of ??placing two 748cc two-stroke three-cylinder engines in the engine compartment, and the power generated by these two engines was sent to the front wheels through an improved gearbox. The shaft provides power.
After being equipped with dual engines, the output of the Saab 93 Monstret reached 138 horsepower, and the top speed reached 196km/h. However, the dual-engine front-wheel drive layout made the vehicle's handling very poor, so it was also given the nickname "Monstret".
Obviously, because the design of the Saab 93 Monstret was unrealistic, the entire project was directly terminated. The entire project also produced a Saab 93 Monstret, which has been restored and is on display at the Saab Museum in Trollhattan, Sweden.
The advent of the Mini Twin Moke actually stemmed from the needs of the British military. At that time, the British military wanted to have a four-wheel drive military light off-road vehicle with a simple structure and unique features, so Alec Issigonis, the father of Mini, proposed a solution of directly adding an additional engine to the Mini Moke, and thus the Mini Twin Moke was born. .
Compared with the ordinary Mini Moke, the Mini Twin Moke adds a 1098cc engine and a gearbox behind the second row of seats. The output power is used to drive the rear axle, while the original The engine still provides power to the front axle, enabling four-wheel drive. In specific tests, the Mini Twin Moke was able to climb a slope with a slope of 1:2, and its impressive performance even made the US military at the time interested in it.
However, the weight increase brought by the second engine makes the Mini Twin Moke unsuitable for helicopter air transport, and compared to Land Rover and Jeep products, the Mini Twin Moke also appears to be very average in terms of ground clearance and off-road performance. , but in the end, we still didn’t get the order from the military.
The Scirocco Mk 2 was a model derived from the Golf GTI back then. Due to its good performance and affordable price, it was favored by many consumers. In this context, Volkswagen intends to create more possibilities for the Scirocco Mk 2, so the idea of ??a dual-engine version of the Scirocco Mk 2 was put forward.
As a result, Volkswagen did the same thing and installed two 1.8-liter four-cylinder engines in the Scirocco Mk 2, each outputting 180 horsepower; this instantly made the Scirocco Mk 2 a car with 360 horsepower and 180 horsepower. A small steel cannon with four-wheel drive. In actual testing, the dual-engine version of the Scirocco Mk2 actually ran a top speed of 290km/h, and accelerated from 0-100km/h in just 4.1 seconds, which is much better than the Audi Quattro with a four-wheel drive system during the same period.
Although Volkswagen seemed to be interested in launching the twin-engine Scirocco Mk2 on the market, and even published an advert in a magazine to ridicule Porsche, in the end this car did not appear on the market. Then in 1987, Volkswagen built a Golf with a twin engine based on the same formula and participated in the Pikes Peak Mountain Climb that year. Unfortunately, although this Golf was fast, it retired due to mechanical failure 200 meters before the finish line, and ultimately missed the championship.
Hurricane is a concept car released by Jeep at the 2005 North American Auto Show. Its shape was created by designer Aaron Pizzuti and adopts the setting of a two-seat off-road vehicle.
The biggest feature of the Hurricane concept car is that it is equipped with two 5.7-liter HEMI V8 engines with a total output of 670 horsepower. All power is transmitted to all four wheels through a 5-speed automatic transmission. Because the driver uses a lot of aluminum and carbon fiber parts, the Hurricane concept car weighs only 1,746 kilograms; even with 20-inch off-road tires, it can still accelerate from 100 kilometers to 100 kilometers in just over 5 seconds.
In addition to the dual-engine setting, the Hurricane concept car also uses a four-wheel steering system designed by Chrysler. The four wheels can rotate in the same direction and can even drive sideways.
MTM, a modification company founded by Roland Mayer in 1990, has always been known for being "crazy". To say that their proudest work is the MTM Bimoto, which is based on the original Audi TT.
MTM Bimoto came out in 2002. MTM installed two 1.8-liter inline four-cylinder turbocharged engines with a combined output of 652 horsepower. The two engines are each equipped with a 6-speed dual-clutch gearbox. . The German car magazine "Auto Motorund Sport" tested this car in 2003 and achieved a top speed of 374km/h.
In 2009, MTM took this car to the test track in Papenburg for an actual test. The actual measured top speed at that time was 393km/h.
It is understood that MTM currently intends to further upgrade this twin-engine TT, with the goal of making its output exceed 1,000 horsepower and its top speed exceeding 400km/h.