I pondered treating this subject in verse because of the wonder.
This a 200 bhp Kawasaki ZX14 bike engine. Not a cutaway drawing but a photograph of an engine where metal has been removed to expose the innards. Cutaways have had a powerful, almost mystical, effect on me ever since childhood. Sounds pretentiously goofy, but just reflect.
Dismantling a mechanical device does not really reveal its secrets. One ends up with parts; the relationships between them are lost. But cutting down like this takes you into places where a human being has no right to be. Inside the cylinder head where temperatures may exceed 600 deg C. Down into the crankcase where the shaft rotates a hundred times a second. And a ringside view of how the shaft's rotation is converted into an up-and-down action to open and close the valves.
OK, none of these things will happen because of the surgery inflicted on this engine. But they're only an imaginary step away. Roller bearings, for instance, even out loads and reduce friction, preventing the engine from destroying itself. On their own they are simple, unexceptional metal cylinders. On a cutaway engine, however, I may see and touch them, set in their cages, their function obvious.
This little world is compact, purposeful, precise and shorn of unnecessary detail. Engines themselves are commonplace but their function is a series of interlinked actions that to a lay person are - or should be - minor miracles. And the cutaway allows us to look into this world as it is. It's not magic, it's real!
