Engine Trends:
The infernal combustion engine has been with us for a long time - since about 1885. Familiar layouts soon appeared with, for example, six cylinders seen as early as 1902. Multiple valves per cylinder, double overhead cam-shafts, super-chargers, turbo-chargers, and fuel injection are all well and truly pre-war. After that, it might be said that there was no very novel and lasting engine concept (perhaps the Wankel rotary engine excepted) until the oil crisis and stricter anti-pollution laws started a movement towards greater engine efficiency. Engines have grown more efficient and less polluting (if well maintained) since the 1980s but cars and 4WDs grew heavier and bigger in the 1990s as oil prices fell, cancelling out some of the gains. Some day oil will become inordinately expensive to use as a fuel, as OPEC's production squeeze of 2000 reminds us. Getting ready for that day, a number of refinements of, and alternatives to, the internal combustion engine are coming to show-rooms or running in laboratories and in test vehicles.
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