As the V8 engine is still popular then why hasn’t the straight 8 been modernised and offered in today’s market ?
Dan Punchard:
As the V8 engine is still popular then why hasn’t the straight 8 been modernised and offered in today’s market ?
IMHO by the early 80’s the Gardner engine had had it’s day and had been surpassed in all respects by many of the “in house” engines produced by the manufactures for their own chassis,in particular I would say that the Scania engines had passed the Gardner comfortably by this time.The whole firm of Gardner was rooted in the past and totally antiquated and their designs could never be improved any further,which was very sad but never-the-less a fact.Cheers Bewick.
Dennis I didn’t actually mean by Gardners ,I meant in general .
Dan Punchard:
Dennis I didn’t actually mean by Gardners ,I meant in general .
There’s no way is a straight 8 compact enough for to-days markets,maybe OK in the engine bay of a Junk or an off-shore rescue vessel ! Cheers Dennis.
Dan Punchard:
As the V8 engine is still popular then why hasn’t the straight 8 been modernised and offered in today’s market ?
In general 6 cylinders is about the practical limit for the inline configuration just as 12 cylinders is around the practical limit for V engines in most types of road automotive applications.Above those limits all sorts of size and engineering issues apply.The problem ( advantage of inline engines ) being that inline engines obviously have a full length bore layout and have wider,individual,big end bearing journals.But controlling torsional stresses increase as crankshaft length increases requiring an equivalent increase in the amount of main bearings to support the crank.The combination of which requires a relatively much longer block than in the case of a V engine with an equivalent amount of cylinders.Hence the reason why the straight 8 was killed off in most types of automotive applications being that it needs almost as much space in length as a V16 would.
As for Gardner they obviously used the inline 8 configuration because it was the easiest practical option in the case of needing to add power by increasing capacity without developing a totally new larger capacity inline 6 or V8 engine to do it.
Bewick:
Dan Punchard:
Dennis I didn’t actually mean by Gardners ,I meant in general .There’s no way is a straight 8 compact enough for to-days markets,maybe OK in the engine bay of a Junk or an off-shore rescue vessel ! Cheers Dennis.
In general 6 cylinders in a line has always been the most practical limit on the road or in the air in either straight 6,V12,or X/H 24 configurations.
As Rolls and Napier knew since at least the 1930’s. 
fryske:
Sadly people, this is only a recreation of those rare beasts…This until recently had a 6LXB installed…
The 8LXB came from a poorly C series ERFThe hunt goes on…
Just being pedantic, and quite ready to be corrected, but if the 8 cylinder in question came from a C series surely it’s an 8LXC? Now thinking of a C series donor how about a big J 8LXCT or even a 6LYT?
Why not just use a “proper” engine? Oh, I almost forgot, they did!
folowin this tread from almost begin to think the only angel of picture that convince Dennis is to find a photograpy taken to a mirror ;bought sides in same ,cheers benkku
acd1202:
fryske:
Sadly people, this is only a recreation of those rare beasts…This until recently had a 6LXB installed…
The 8LXB came from a poorly C series ERFThe hunt goes on…
Just being pedantic, and quite ready to be corrected, but if the 8 cylinder in question came from a C series surely it’s an 8LXC? Now thinking of a C series donor how about a big J 8LXCT or even a 6LYT?
hiya…NO wrong not just because the ERF was a C series wouldn’t mean the engine was Gardner turbo…the C was ERF model
nothing to do with which engine was fitted.
John
3300John:
acd1202:
fryske:
Sadly people, this is only a recreation of those rare beasts…This until recently had a 6LXB installed…
The 8LXB came from a poorly C series ERFThe hunt goes on…
Just being pedantic, and quite ready to be corrected, but if the 8 cylinder in question came from a C series surely it’s an 8LXC? Now thinking of a C series donor how about a big J 8LXCT or even a 6LYT?
hiya…NO wrong not just because the ERF was a C series wouldn’t mean the engine was Gardner turbo…the C was ERF model
nothing to do with which engine was fitted.
John
Yep - the owner of the Guy told me that it is a 240 Gardner
bma.finland:
0
folowin this tread from almost begin to think the only angel of picture that convince Dennis is to find a photograpy taken to a mirror ;bought sides in same ,cheers benkku
Hej benkku,don’t you think we have more than enough aggro in the UK looking for this elusive “beast”,without you taking the search International 
It is all we need you claiming to have one on your island 
You’ll be overun with Big J 8LXB “spotters” from the UK if you are not careful,a bit like “twitchers” (bird watchers) who will travel miles to spot a rare bird like the “Oooo me goolies” bird ! Cheers benkku Dennis.
3300John:
acd1202:
fryske:
Sadly people, this is only a recreation of those rare beasts…This until recently had a 6LXB installed…
The 8LXB came from a poorly C series ERFThe hunt goes on…
Just being pedantic, and quite ready to be corrected, but if the 8 cylinder in question came from a C series surely it’s an 8LXC? Now thinking of a C series donor how about a big J 8LXCT or even a 6LYT?
hiya…NO wrong not just because the ERF was a C series wouldn’t mean the engine was Gardner turbo…the C was ERF model
nothing to do with which engine was fitted.
John
The 8LXC wasn’t turbocharged - it was the 265. The 8LXCT was the turbocharged 300. The introduction of the C Series conveniently coincided with the introduction of the 8LXC (which was closely followed by the 8LXCT) and there were significantly more installed in C Series chassis than 8LXBs. In fact, given that the 6LXCT was already being offered, I can’t think why anyone would’ve wanted an 8LXB in a C Series ERF.
By the time the ERF C-series was introduced I can’t think why anyone would want a Gardner anyway. There were other better, cheaper, lighter and more powerful engines available at that time.
IMHO, of course!
Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more!
^^^^^^^^^^^
Retired Old ■■■■:
By the time the ERF C-series was introduced I can’t think why anyone would want a Gardner anyway. There were other better, cheaper, lighter and more powerful engines available at that time.
IMHO, of course!
We ran upto 40 “C” series ERFs all Gardner powered most were kept for 10 years plus some a lot longer
We even ran Gardner powered “E” series again for many years mostly trouble free
They were purchased for weight fuel economy and reliability ( our annual mileage was astronomical)
Again each to their own
Well IMO The old Gardner engine was the best in its day, I think what a lot of drivers didn’t like about them was they had to be geared right, The Foden 12 speed was a good match to the 150s I had, They Scammell I drove had the 180 in it but the Thornycroft 6 speed box wasn’t a good match IMO, it seemed to perform better with the Leyland 680PP engine being slightly faster reving, I recall a pal of mine driving a Aki with the David Brown Splitter box in & he said it was very good, But they never seemed to catch on for some unknown reason, Of course if you had an Eaton 2 speed it made all the difference in the world, Regards Larry.
Lawrence Dunbar:
Well IMO The old Gardner engine was the best in its day, I think what a lot of drivers didn’t like about them was they had to be geared right, The Foden 12 speed was a good match to the 150s I had, They Scammell I drove had the 180 in it but the Thornycroft 6 speed box wasn’t a good match IMO, it seemed to perform better with the Leyland 680PP engine being slightly faster reving, I recall a pal of mine driving a Aki with the David Brown Splitter box in & he said it was very good, But they never seemed to catch on for some unknown reason, Of course if you had an Eaton 2 speed it made all the difference in the world, Regards Larry.
As far as I recall Larry the David Brown splitter box was a disaster,I understand it was rushed into production to compete with the Eaton/Fuller 610 and 9509 boxes which were superior to anything else on the market in the early 70’s.The DB 6:600 box was useless above 180bhp so I suppose DB had to come up with something but their splitter box wasn’t the answer unfortunately! Cheers Dennis.