Manufacturers like to use a lot of acronyms on their cars. Variable valve lift (VVL) and variable valve timing (VVT) are two of the most popular ones. These systems sound pretty similar, but what do ...

Valve overlap—that crucial interval when both the intake and exhaust valves are open, expressed in degrees of crankshaft rotation—is typically a fixed parameter and always a compromise. For example, ...

The first production car engine with variable valve timing (VVT) came from Alfa Romeo in 1980. It was installed in the fuel-injected Alfa Romeo Spider. Before this, a few experimental systems existed, ...

Though it's been called many things, the VTEC acronym stands for Variable Valve Timing and Lift Electronic Control. VVTLEC doesn't quite roll off the lips, but the adjectives one tends to spew out ...

Michal studies Automotive Journalism at Coventry University in the UK, and has been writing for CarBuzz since March 2025. He was nominated for student culture piece of the year recently and has been ...

Timing belts themselves are relatively inexpensive but can easily cause thousands of dollars of damage if they break while the engine is running. Engines come in two configurations: Interference and ...