A car engine basically has thousands of mini explosions happening inside of it, is has parts moving very fast and generating tons of heat, and experiences extreme temperature fluctuations on a daily basis. Yet it is the part that usually dies last in a car.
How do they make them last so long and why are we unable to make other parts of the car as long lasting, such as tires and brakes?
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The simple answer is “built to take it”.
An engine isn’t much different to anything else, where as long as it is allowed to work within what the materials it’s made of can take, it’ll be (mostly) fine. Take something as simple as a chair you own. You can sit on it, stand on it, put things on it and do this millions of times and it’ll be fine. Have an elephant try and sit on it and it breaks.
All materials have yield points of different sorts. It’s why some metals can be shot with bullets and it doesn’t even leave a mark, while others the bullet goes through as if it wasn’t even there. Or why a broom stick works well for cleaning floors with a broom, but makes a terrible shovel handle.
This is basically what engineering is about. Know the limits of a material and using the correct material for the job, and trying to use just enough of it to make it work.
The more complex answer is when you start talking about how it works, as others have pointed out with oils for protection, cooling systems etc.
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