Lubricating structure of internal combustion engine and motorcycle

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10087796-B2
Application number	US-201615335103-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 26, 2016
Priority date	Oct 27, 2015
Publication date	Oct 2, 2018
Grant date	Oct 2, 2018

Abstract

An aspect of the invention is directed to a lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine for feeding oil from an oil pump to respective portions of the internal combustion engine where a balancer shaft is disposed in parallel with a crankshaft in a crankcase, wherein: a main gallery and an oil passage are provided in the crankcase so that oil can be delivered from the oil pump to the main gallery and the oil of the main gallery can be guided by the oil passage to pass through a bearing of the balancer shaft; and the oil passage feeds the oil that has passed through the bearing of the balancer shaft to a cylinder head.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine for feeding oil from an oil pump to respective portions of the internal combustion engine where a balancer shaft is disposed in parallel with a crankshaft in a crankcase, wherein: a main gallery and an oil passage are provided in the crankcase so that oil can be delivered from the oil pump to the main gallery and the oil of the main gallery can be guided by the oil passage to pass through a bearing of the balancer shaft; the oil passage feeds the oil that has passed through the bearing of the balancer shaft to a cylinder head; a sub gallery for feeding the oil of the main gallery to respective portions of the internal combustion engine is provided in the crankcase; and the oil passage is provided at one of opposite left and right sides of the crankcase while another oil passage for feeding the oil of the main gallery to the sub gallery is provided at the other of said opposite left and right sides of the crankcase.

2. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 1 , wherein the oil passage is provided in the crankcase so as to pass through an axial end of the balancer shaft.

3. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 1 , wherein: the crankcase comprises an upper case and a lower case which are divided from each other vertically; and the bearing of the balancer shaft is disposed in a mating face between the upper case and the lower case.

4. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 1 , wherein a lubricating route from the main gallery toward the cylinder head and a lubricating route from the main gallery toward a bearing of the crankshaft are different from each other.

5. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 1 , wherein an oil return passage for returning the oil from the cylinder head to a lower portion of the internal combustion engine is provided between the oil passage and the other oil passage in a left and right direction of the crankcase.

6. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 1 , wherein:
the balancer shaft serves as a front balancer shaft disposed in front of the crankshaft;
a lower balancer shaft is disposed below the crankshaft; and
the main gallery is provided in front of the lower balancer shaft in the crankcase.

7. A motorcycle comprising: the lubricating structure of the internal combustion engine according to claim 1 .

8. A lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine for feeding oil to a cylinder head from a crankcase in which a balancer shaft is disposed in parallel with a crankshaft, wherein: an oil passage for feeding oil to the cylinder head and an oil return passage for returning the oil from the cylinder head into the crankcase are provided in the crankcase; an outlet of the oil return passage is connected to a balancer chamber on a front side of the crankcase relative to the balancer shaft which is received in the balancer chamber inside the crankcase; a main gallery and a sub gallery are provided in the crankcase so that oil can be fed from the main gallery to a bearing of the balancer shaft and the oil that has passed through the bearing of the balancer shaft can be fed to respective portions of the internal combustion engine through the sub gallery located above the balancer chamber; and the oil return passage passes through the front side of the crankcase relative to the sub gallery.

9. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein the outlet of the oil return passage is connected to a front side of the balancer chamber on one end side of the crankcase in a left and right direction.

10. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein the oil return passage has an inclined passage that is inclined toward the front of the crankcase so that the inclined passage becomes vertical when the crankcase is mounted in a vehicle.

11. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein a cam chain chamber where a cam chain is received inside the crankcase is provided at one of opposite left and right sides of the crankcase, and the oil return passage is provided at the other of said opposite left and right sides of the crankcase.

12. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein the oil passage is provided at one of opposite left and right sides of the crankcase and the oil return passage is provided at the other of said opposite left and right sides of the crankcase.

13. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein the oil passage feeds the oil that has passed through a bearing of the balancer shaft to the cylinder head.

14. The lubricating structure of an internal combustion engine according to claim 8 , wherein:
the balancer shaft serves as a front balancer shaft disposed in front of the crankshaft;
a lower balancer shaft is disposed below the crankshaft; and
the main gallery is provided in front of the lower balancer shaft in the crankcase.

15. A motorcycle comprising: the lubricating structure of the internal combustion engine according to claim 8 .

Assignees

• Suzuki Motor Corp

Inventors

• Tsukamoto Kohei
• Katsuya Yosuke
• Yagi Shintaro

Classifications

• F01M2011/028

  for lubricating balance shafts · CPC title

• F01M1/06

  Lubricating systems characterised by the provision therein of crankshafts or connecting rods with lubricant passageways, e.g. bores (crankshafts, connecting-rods, per se F16C) · CPC title

• F01M11/02 Primary

  Arrangements of lubricant conduits · CPC title

• F01M1/02

  using lubricating pumps (pumps in general F04; lubricating pumps per se F16N) · CPC title

• F16F15/264

  Rotating balancer shafts (F16F15/262 takes precedence) · CPC title