Audioguía Instruments and accessories

Research activities, which constitute an important part of the link between the past and the future of motoring, are represented through the collection of technical and scientific instruments.

The temporal evolution of the typology and technical characteristics of the finds follows hand in hand the scientific development of the various research fields, as well as the considerable technological progress of the motor sector. The oldest instruments, dating back to the second half of the 19th century, are those used at the Royal Application School for Engineers and Architects for the study of steam engines and, subsequently, in the first internal combustion engines.

Most of them concern the main physical quantities on which the functioning of a fluid machine depends: rotation speed, temperature, pressure, driving torque. The most valuable ones are the pressure indicators used for the experimental measurement of the pressure cycles inside the engine cylinders. Some of these are able to measure the physical quantity and, at the same time, represent its trend over time in a graph on a paper tape.

With the evolution of technology, we have moved from purely mechanical and analogical instruments to the use of electronic and digital instruments, characterized by greater precision and accuracy, up to the point of integration with modern computerized systems.

A particular category is represented by dynamometric brakes, i.e. the equipment used both to dissipate the power developed by an engine during experimental tests in the test bench, and to measure, through appropriate sensors, the engine torque delivered under various operating conditions.

Finally, this vast and heterogeneous collection also includes various equipment, such as carburettors, injection pumps and some wooden aeronautical propellers. The rarest and oldest ones are part of a set of aeronautical equipment sold by Germany after the end of the First World War, together with numerous engines.

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