What is the meaning of the letter V as found in V6 written on most cars?

It has nothing to do with valves. A V6 will have between 12 and 24 valves.

V is the engine configuration. A V engine has 2 banks of cylinders sharing a single crank. The cylinders are offset from one another at (usually) a 60 or 90 degree angle.

This is contrasted with an inline engine, where all the cylinders are in a row along a single plane. So an I6 is typically about twice as long as a V6. (That’s why V6s exist, by the way…they fit in a much smaller engine bay.)

Inline engines tend to be easier to work on, and larger ones run much more smoothly than V-engines. But inline engines larger than I-4 are pretty big, so they don’t see a lot of use these days. The reason you see a lot more V6s now than you used to (AFAIK, V6s hardly existed before the 60s, and they didn’t get popular till the 80s) is that it is difficult to get a V6 to balance correctly. As a quirk of its design, a V6 will vibrate like mad if it doesn’t have “balance shafts” spinning weights around to counteract the motion of the pistons. It wasn’t until relatively recently that companies got good at designing those shafts.

The only inline 6s in use in new vehicles today are in BMWs, some Australian Fords, and diesel trucks. Any other 6 cylinders are V-6 or VR-6. (VR6 packs the cylinders even more tightly than V6. It’s a Volkswagen thing.)

Oh, another thing, there is no such thing as a V4 in modern cars. Don’t make that mistake, or you’ll look like an idiot. The last 4-cylinder car that had anything but a Boxer engine (like a V, but the cylinders lay flat, directly opposite each other…used by Porsche and Subaru) or an I4 was made about 30 years ago. (They are still found in some motorcycles, though)

V6 Car Engine

The V as in V6 stands for the shape of the engine. In the case of a V6, there are six cylanders arranged in a V shape with 3 cylanders on each side.

There are others like, I-4 which means that it’s four cylanders in a straight line.

The V in V8 or V6 or V4 or V-twin, stands for Vee

or bent as in bent 8, turn it on it’s side < and you have angle..

it’s the angle that is formed by the connecting rods where they come out of the crankshaft.

a V45 is a 45° degree engine, they come in 30, 45, 60, and 90 degrees. A 180° would be a flat, or Boxer or even pancake and no longer a “V”

Note: V45 could also mean 45 cu in V-2 or V-Twin

It’s not “valve”. Engines come in two configurations. Straight or V. 4 cylinders are almost always straight with the cylinders all in line. 6 cylinders can be either straight or V. The V would have 3 cylinders on one side and the other 3 at about a 30 degree angle on the other side – forming a V. 8 cylinder engines are almost always in a V configuration.

V6 engine is a V engine with six cylinders. It is the second most common engine configuration in modern cars after the inline four. It is one of the most compact engine configurations and is well suited to the popular front-wheel drive layout. It is becoming more common as the space allowed for engines in modern cars is reduced at the same time as power requirements increase, and has largely replaced the inline-6, which is too long to fit in most modern engine compartments.

The V is the shape of the engine. The pistons come up from the center at an angle, and if you look at the engine from straight on, it is shaped like a “V”. There are three cylinders on each side of the V

A “Straight 6” or “inline 6” has all 6 cylinders in a straight line.

they called v because it’s 3 on each side and they run on one crankshaft and the piston is goingto an angel.

now they also have a 4 cylinder but 4 cylinder are straight and in a row ,and all newer cars now they are making 5 cylinder i think they are making them staright

also there is v8 ,v10,v12

and on the honda insight and the smartfor2 are 3 cylinder cars

It represents the design of the engine cylinders. They are offset into a V shape, versus a straight engine, where the cylinders are set perpendicular to the floor.

To my knowledge, which isn’t much, but its the shape of the cylinders…. they are like a V. 6 cylinders in a V shape instead of a in line 4. Also they have V8 and V10’s!