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With the alarming increase in vehicular population, there is depletion of fossil fuel availability. Hence to overcome the difficulties, alternative fuels are tested and used in parts of the world. One of the difficulties with usage of alternate fuels is their high viscosity in comparison to fossil fuels. To overcome this, preheating of biofuel is a good option as it makes the fuel less viscous. In our research, we have used a helical coil heat exchanger to preheat the inlet fuel using the engine’s exhaust gas, making the system more sustainable since no external energy is used. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of preheating device a simulation study has been carried for the ethanol based biofuels. For simulation work, a set of boundary conditions has been arrived based on the experimental analysis. The results from the experiment such as velocity of air and fuel inlet were utilized as input for simulation work.

The present research deals with study of pongamia oil methyl ester as a lubricant by blending with anti-wear additive ZDDP. The experimental work carried in this work aims to investigates the friction and wear characteristics by blending zinc diakyldithio phosphates (ZDDP) with pongamia oil methyl ester as lubricant under various loading conditions and temperatures. The coefficient of friction and wear scar depth were determined using pongamia biodiesel blended with 0.3%, 0.6% and 1 % ZDDP by concentration through high frequency reciprocating wear testing machine for 2 h duration. The reciprocating wear tests were performed on an engine liner-piston ring contact under the loads of 40 N, 60 N and 80 N for 2 h duration at temperatures of 100°C, 125°C 150° C with 10 Hz oscillation frequency. The addition of ZDDP with pongamia biodiesel showed marginal reduction in friction coefficient and wear scar depth under all loads and temperatures.

Alternative fuels for both spark ignition (SI) and compression ignition (CI) engines have become very important owing to increased environmental protection concern, the need to reduce dependency on petroleum and even socioeconomic aspects. An appropriate sustainable fuel alternative has turn out to be a main concern and bio-diesel is one of the sustainable fuels. The path of interest in biodiesel has highlighted its advantages which include decrease in hydrocarbon and particulate matter. Meanwhile its shortcoming includes higher emission of oxides of nitrogen. This work is an attempt to develop a mathematical relationship to predict thermal NOx in CI engine fuelled with neat biodiesel. Attention was focused on using in-cylinder pressure based variables to predict NOx. In cylinder pressure measurement is a valuable tool for the analysis of CI engine combustion, which is used for finding the heat release rate, ignition delay, etc.