This machine is destined to completely revolutionize engine engineering and replace everything that exists. (From Rudolf Diesel's letter of October 2, 1892 to the publisher Julius Springer.)
Although Diesel's stated goal has never been fully-achievable of course, the diesel engine indeed revolutionized drive systems. This handbook documents the current state of diesel engine engineering and technology. The impetus to publish a Handbook of Diesel Engines grew out of ruminations on Rudolf Diesel's transformation of his idea for a rational heat engine into reality more than 100 years ago. Once the patent was filed in 1892 and work on his engine commenced the following year, Rudolf Diesel waited another 4 years until the Association of German Engineers provided him a platform to present his engine to the public at its convention in Kassel on June 16, 1897. The engine came to bear the name of its ingenious inventor soon...