We have England's Harry Ricardo to thank for this type combustion chamber, which he created to cope with conditions that ceased to exist long before most of us were born. During the conflict that wracked Europe just after the turn of this century, there were not only shortages of internal combustion engine fuels, but the fuels available were of very poor quality – and would detonate severely in the side-valve engines of that
period unless the engines were operated with a much-retarded spark, or their compression ratios lowered to about 4:1, or both. These measures had a terrible effect on fuel economy, naturally, and the problem led Ricardo to do serious research into the nature of detonation. We now know that the side-valve engine is particularly prone to detonation, as it of necessity has a very long combustion chamber. Ignite a fire at one end, and it will be a long while reaching the far corners of the chamber. In the interval between ignition and the completion of burning there is ample opportunity for the unburned part of the charge to overheat and ignite.
