An Innovative Oil Control Ring Designed by Powder Metallurgy Techniques

An innovative two-piece oil control ring design, named Monoland, has been developed aiming to have high conformability and optimized specific contact pressure. As a result, the Monoland provides superior oil scraping efficiency with reduced friction losses. These were achieved by tailoring the geometrical features and material properties.

A solution for oil control rings of minor moment of inertia and higher conformability was achieved through a new geometrical design concept where: a) only one land of the ring is in contact with the bore, b) the outer and inner faces are linked by two convergent planes and by means of a Powder Metallurgy (P/M) steel that was tailored to a lower modulus of elasticity.

The new ring design had its structural robustness checked by finite element analysis and its scraping capacity measured by lubricant oil consumption measurement in engine tests.