Cylinder head

In an internal combustion engine, the cylinder head (often abbreviated to simply "head") sits above the cylinders and forms the roof of the combustion chamber. In sidevalve engines, the head is a simple sheet of metal; whereas in more modern overhead valve and overhead camshaft engines, the cylinder head is a more complicated block often containing inlet and exhaust passages, coolant passages, valves, camshafts, spark plugs and fuel injectors. Most straight engines have a single cylinder head shared by all of the cylinders and most V engines have two cylinder heads (one per bank of cylinders).

Side view of a DOHC cylinder head (with the valves and camshafts installed)
Underside of a OHV cylinder head (with the valves installed)
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