Low weight reciprocating engine

Claim 1

A head for an internal combustion engine, comprising: (a) a one piece integral casting comprised of a nonallotropic metal having a thermal conductivity of at least 0.25 cal./cm 2 /cm/sec./° C. and less than 5% alloying ingredients, said casting having a flat deck bottom and walls defining a plurality of aligned cylinder roofs extending upwardly from said deck, said casting further having walls defining a plurality of intake and exhaust passages extending through certain of said roof walls, and said casting further having walls defining valve guide cylinders associated with each exhaust intake passage, (b) means defining limited channels for cooling fluid to flow in one path in series along the sides of each of said roof walls and in another path in series past each of said valve guide cylinders, said channels opening upon said deck substantially along their entire length, and (c) each cylinder wall having an integral non-allotropic metal alloy rich zone extending along at least the exposed surface of said valve guide cylinder, said alloy rich zone being comprised of an alloy mixture having ingredients selected from the group consisting of silicon, copper, nickel, carbon, tungsten, molybdenum, zirconium, vanadium, magnesium, zinc, chromium, cobalt, manganese and titanium, the remainder being said non-allotropic metal.