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A numerical analysis was performed to study the variation of the laminar burning speed of gasoline-ethanol blend, pressure, temperature and dilution using the one-dimensional premixed flame code CHEMKIN™. A semi-detailed validated chemical kinetic model (142 species and 672 reactions) for a gasoline surrogate fuel was used. The pure components in the surrogate fuel consist of n-heptane, isooctane and toluene. The ethanol mole fraction was varied from 0 to 85 percent, initial pressure from 4 to 8 bar, initial temperature from 300 to 600K, and the EGR dilution from 0 to 32% to represent the in-cylinder conditions of a spark-ignition engine. The laminar flame speed is found to increase with ethanol concentration and temperature but decrease with pressure and dilution.

Active regeneration experiments were performed on a production diesel aftertreatment system containing a diesel oxidation catalyst and catalyzed particulate filter (CPF) using blends of soy-based biodiesel. The effects of biodiesel on particulate matter oxidation rates in the filter were explored. These experiments are a continuation of the work performed by Chilumukuru et al., in SAE Technical Paper No. 2009-01-1474, which studied the active regeneration characteristics of the same aftertreatment system using ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel. Experiments were conducted using a 10.8 L 2002 Cummins ISM heavy-duty diesel engine. Particulate matter loading of the filter was performed at the rated engine speed of 2100 rpm and 20% of the full engine load of 1120 Nm. At this engine speed and load the passive oxidation rate is low. The 17 L CPF was loaded to a particulate matter level of 2.2 g/L.

Alternative and renewable fuels show tremendous promise for addressing concerns of energy security, energy supply, and CO₂ emissions. However, the new fuels have the potential to produce non-regulated exhaust components that may be as detrimental or worse, than currently regulated emissions components. For the 2009 SAE Clean Snowmobile Challenge (CSC), a commercially available Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectrometer was used to sample raw exhaust from eight student teams' snowmobiles for comparative analysis with a conventional emissions bench. The levels of CO₂, CO, NO , O₂, and THC were compared for the five operating modes, which included both gasoline- and diesel-powered snowmobiles. The fuel was either an ethanol blend for spark-ignition engines or a biodiesel for compression-ignition engines. Final emissions result scores varied by less than 2% between the conventional emissions bench and the FTIR.

An operational scheme with fuel-lean and exhaust gas dilution in spark-ignited engines increases thermal efficiency and decreases NOx emission, while these operations inherently induce combustion instability and thus large cycle-to-cycle variation in engine. In order to stabilize combustion variations, the development of an advanced ignition system is becoming critical. To quantify the impact of spark-ignition discharge, ignitability tests were conducted in an optically accessible combustion vessel to characterize the flame kernel development of lean methane-air mixture with CO₂ simulating exhaust diluent. A shrouded fan was used to generate turbulence in the vicinity of J-gap spark plug and a Variable Output Ignition System (VOIS) capable of producing a varied set of spark discharge patterns was developed and used as an ignition source. The main feature of the VOIS is to vary the secondary current during glow discharge including naturally decaying and truncated with multiple strikes.

High hydrocarbon (HC) emission during a cold start still remains one of the major emission control challenges for spark ignition (SI) engines in spite of about three decades of research in this area. This paper proposes a cold start HC emission control strategy based on a reduced order modeling technique. A novel singular perturbation approximation (SPA) technique, based on the balanced realization principle, is developed for a nonlinear experimentally validated cold start emission model. The SPA reduced model is then utilized in the design of a model-based sliding mode controller (SMC). The controller targets to reduce cumulative tailpipe HC emission using a combination of fuel injection, spark timing, and air throttle / idle speed controls. The results from the designed multi-input multi-output (MIMO) reduced order SMC are compared with those from a full order SMC. The results show the reduced SMC outperforms the full order SMC by reducing both engine-out and tailpipe HC emission.

This paper studies the bi-directional power flow control between Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEVs) and an electrical grid. A grid-tied charging system that enables both Grid-to-Vehicle (G2V) and Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) charging/discharging is modeled using SimPowerSystems in Matlab/Simulink environment. A bi-directional AC-DC converter and a bi-directional DC-DC buck-boost converter are integrated to charge and discharge PEV batteries. For AC-DC converter control, Predictive Current Control (PCC) strategy is employed to enable grid current to reach a reference current after one modulation period. In addition, Phase Lock Loop (PLL) and a band-stop filter are designed to lock the grid voltage phase and reduce harmonics. Bi-directional power flow is realized by controlling the mode of the DC-DC converter. Simulation tests are conducted to evaluate the performance of this bi-directional charging system.

Interest in natural gas as an alternative fuel source to petroleum fuels for light-duty vehicle applications has increased due to its domestic availability and stable price compared to gasoline. With its higher hydrogen-to-carbon ratio, natural gas has the potential to reduce engine out carbon dioxide emissions, which has shown to be a strong greenhouse gas contributor. For part-load conditions, the lower flame speeds of natural gas can lead to an increased duration in the inflammation process with traditional port-injection. Direct-injection of natural gas can increase in-cylinder turbulence and has the potential to reduce problems typically associated with port-injection of natural gas, such as lower flame speeds and poor dilution tolerance. A study was designed and executed to investigate the effects of direct-injection of natural gas at part-load conditions.

Recognition of Dimethyl Ether (DME) as an alternative fuel has been growing recently due to its fast evaporation and ignition in application of compression-ignition engine. Most importantly, combustion of DME produces almost no particulate matter (PM). The current study provides a further understanding of the combustion process in DME reacting spray via experiment done in a constant volume combustion chamber. Formaldehyde (CH2O), an important intermediate species in hydrocarbon combustion, has received much attention in research due to its unique contribution in chemical pathway that leads to the combustion and emission of fuels. Studies in other literature considered CH2O as a marker for UHC species since it is formed prior to diffusion flame. In this study, the formation of CH2O was highlighted both temporally and spatially through planar laser induced fluorescence (PLIF) imaging at wavelength of 355-nm of an Nd:YAG laser at various time after start of injection (ASOI).

The vehicle driving cycles affect the performance of a hybrid vehicle control strategy, as a result, the overall performance of the vehicle, such as fuel consumption and emission. By identifying the driving cycles of a vehicle, the control system is able to dynamically change the control strategy (or parameters) to the best one to adapt to the changes of vehicle driving patterns. This paper studies the supervised driving cycle recognition using pattern recognition approach. With pattern recognition method, a driving cycle is represented by feature vectors that are formed by a set of parameters to which the driving cycle is sensitive. The on-line driving pattern recognition is achieved by calculating the feature vectors and classifying these feature vectors to one of the driving patterns in the reference database. To establish reference driving cycle database, the representative feature vectors for four federal driving cycles are generated using feature extraction method.

Energy management is one of the key challenges for the development of Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) due to its complex powertrain structure. Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) simulation provides an open software architecture which enables rapid prototyping HEV energy management system. This paper presents the investigation of the energy management system for a single shaft parallel hybrid electric vehicle using dSPACE eDrive HIL system. The parallel hybrid electric vehicle, energy management system, and low-level Electronic Control Unit (ECU) were modeled using dSPACE Automotive Simulation Models and dSPACE blocksets. Vehicle energy management is achieved by a vehicle-level controller called hybrid ECU, which controls vehicle operation mode and torque distribution among Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) and electric motor. The individual powertrain components such as ICE, electric motor, and transmission are controlled by low-level ECUs.

Diesel combustion and emissions formation is spray and mixing controlled and understanding spray parameters is key to determining the impact of fuel injector operation and nozzle design on combustion and emissions. In this study, both spray visualization and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling were undertaken to investigate key mechanisms for liquid length fluctuations. For the experimental portion of this study a common rail piezoelectric injector was tested in an optically accessible constant volume combustion vessel. Liquid penetration of the spray was determined via processing of images acquired from Mie back scattering under vaporizing conditions by injecting into a charge gas at elevated temperature with a 0% oxygen environment. Tests were undertaken at a gas density of 34.8 kg/m₃, 2000 bar injection pressure, and at ambient temperatures of 900, 1100, and 1300 K.

Vehicle operation during cold-start powertrain conditions can have a significant impact on drivability, fuel economy and tailpipe emissions in modern passenger vehicles. As efforts continue to maximize fuel economy in passenger vehicles, considerable engineering resources are being spent in order to reduce the consumption penalties incurred shortly after engine start and during powertrain warmup while maintaining suitably low levels of tailpipe emissions. Engine downsizing, advanced transmissions and hybrid-electric architecture can each have an appreciable effect on cold-start strategy and its impact on fuel economy. This work seeks to explore the cold-start strategy of several passenger vehicles with different powertrain architectures and to understand the resulting fuel economy impact relative to warm powertrain operation. To this end, four vehicles were chosen with different powertrain architectures.

This study examines the feasibility of broadening the fuel capabilities of a direct-injected two-stroke engine with stratified combustion. A three cylinder, direct-injected two-stroke engine was modified to operate on JP-5, a kerosene-based jet fuel that is heavier, more viscous, and less volatile than gasoline. Demonstration of engine operation with such a fuel after appropriate design modifications would significantly enhance the utilization of this engine in a variety of applications. Results have indicated that the performance characteristics of this engine with jet fuel are similar to that of gasoline with respect to torque and power output at low speeds and loads, but the engine's performance is hampered at the higher speeds and loads by the occurrence of knock.

The objective of this research was to evaluate the effects that higher fluid injection pressures and nozzle geometry have on compound fuel injector nozzle performance. Higher pressures are shown to significantly reduce droplet size, increase the discharge coefficient and reduce the overall size of a nozzle spray. It is also shown that the geometry has a significant effect on nozzle performance, and it can be manipulated to give a desired spray shape.

One-dimensional simulation methods for unsteady (transient) engine operations have been developed and published in previous studies. These 1-D methods utilize heat release and emissions results obtained from 3-D CFD simulations which are stored in a data library. The goal of this study is to improve the 1-D methodology by optimizing the control strategies. Also, additional independent parameters are introduced to extend the 3-D data library, while, as in the previous studies, the number of interpolation points for each parameter remains small. The data points for the 3-D simulations are selected in the vicinity of the expected trajectories obtained from the independent parameter changes, as predicted by the transient 1-D simulations. By this approach, the number of time-consuming 3-D simulations is limited to a reasonable amount.

Exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) has been employed in a diesel engine to reduce NOx emissions by diluting the fresh air charge with gases composed of primarily N2, CO2, H2O, and O2 from the engines exhaust stream. The addition of EGR reduces the production of NOx by lowering the peak cylinder gas temperature and reducing the concentration of O2 molecules, both of which contribute to the NOx formation mechanism. The amount of EGR has been typically controlled using an open loop control strategy where the flow of EGR was calibrated to the engine speed and load and controlled by the combination of an EGR valve and the ratio of the boost and exhaust back pressures. When oxygenated biofuels with lower specific energy are used, the engine control unit (ECU) will demand a higher fuel rate to maintain power output, which can alter the volumetric flow rate of EGR. In addition, oxygenated biofuels affect the oxygen concentration in the intake manifold gas stream.

Lookup tables and functions are widely used in real-time embedded automotive applications to conserve scarce processor resources. To minimize the resource utilization, these lookup tables (LUTs) commonly use custom data structures. The lookup function code is optimized to process these custom data structures. The legacy routines for these lookup functions are very efficient and have been in production for many years. These lookup functions and the corresponding data structures are typically used for calibration tables. The third-party calibration tools are specifically tailored to support these custom data structures. These tools assist the calibrators in optimizing the control algorithm performance for the targeted environment for production. Application software typically contains a mix of both automatically generated software and manually developed code. Some of the same calibration tables may be used in both auto generated and hand-code [ 1 ] [ 2 ].

Hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) is a high-cetane number alternative fuel with the potential of drastic emissions reductions in high-pressure diesel engines. In this study the behavior of HVO sprays is investigated computationally and compared with conventional diesel fuel sprays. The simulations are performed with a modified version of the C++ open source code OpenFOAM using Reynolds-averaged conservation equations for mass, species, momentum and energy. The turbulence has been modeled with a modified version of the RNG k-ε model. In particular, the turbulence interaction between the droplets and the gas has been accounted for by introducing appropriate source terms in the turbulence model equations. The spray simulations reflect the setup of the constant-volume combustion cell from which the experimental data were obtained.

Environmental awareness and fuel economy legislation has resulted in greater emphasis on developing more fuel efficient vehicles. As such, achieving fuel economy improvements has become a top priority in the automotive field. Companies are constantly investigating and developing new advanced technologies, such as hybrid electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, improved turbo-charged gasoline direct injection engines, new efficient powershift transmissions, and lighter weight vehicles. In addition, significant research and development is being performed on energy management control systems that can improve fuel economy of vehicles. Another area of research for improving fuel economy and environmental awareness is based on improving the customer's driving behavior and style without significantly impacting the driver's expectations and requirements.

Recent increases in emissions regulations within the snowmobile industry have led to significant advancements in fuel, exhaust, and control systems on snowmobiles. However, particulate matter is currently an unregulated exhaust component of snowmobile engines. The measurement of dry soot as well as particulate matter from snowmobiles is the focus of this paper. Two industry-representative snowmobiles were chosen for this research which included a 2006 Yamaha Nytro carbureted four-stroke and a 2009 Ski-Doo MX-Z direct-injected two-stroke. Measurements for each snowmobile included gaseous emissions (CO₂, CO, NOx, O₂, and THC), particulate matter collected on quartz filters, and dry soot measured using an AVL Micro Soot Sensor. Each snowmobile was tested over the industry-standard five-mode emissions certification test cycle to determine the emissions, dry soot, and particulate matter levels from idle to wide open throttle (full-load).