Internal combustion engines

An internal combustion engine for propelling an automotive vehicle comprising:

• a frame structure,
• a pair of piston and cylinder assemblies mounted on said frame structure including two side by side cylinders and crankshaft-connected pistons movably mounted in said cylinders for simultaneous movements through repetitive cycles, each including simultaneous compression strokes and immediately following simultaneous power drive strokes,
• a passage between said side-by-side cylinders to communicate the cylinders;
• a fuel injection system including an injector operatively associated with each of said piston and cylinder assemblies, said fuel injection system being constructed and arranged in a shared power mode of operation wherein fuel is injected into only one of said side-by-side cylinders to establish at the beginning of the simultaneous power drive strokes of the pistons of both cylinders a charge of ignitable compressed air fuel mixture in one cylinder and a charge of unignitable compressed air in the other cylinder, and the mixture in said one cylinder is ignited with the resultant pressure therein shared by the other cylinder to affect simultaneous shared power drive strokes of both pistons,
• said fuel injection ignition system further including a controller operable in response to a predetermined operating condition of the automotive vehicle to maintain said internal combustion engine continuously in said shared power mode of operation and while continuously in said shared power mode of operation changing in accordance with a predetermination pattern which one of the two piston and cylinder assemblies of said pair constitutes the one cylinder which has the ignition fuel-air mixture therein.