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The objective of this paper is to introduce a new method for full-field measurement of local average gas-phase fuel concentration in a transient axisymmetrical gas-jet or evaporating spray. Since the combustion process in a diesel engine is a diffusion flame, the local fuel concentration as a function of time is one of the factors that governs engine efficiency and emissions. The method is utilizing the classic Schlieren technique. A CCD camera and frame-grabber combination is used to record the data. Based on these data and the assumption that the flow-field is axisymmetrical, the local index of light refraction is calculated, and from this an estimate of the local gas-phase fuel concentration is made. Since the flow-field is turbulent, data from a large number of separate injections are used. Therefore the results should represent the development of the average flow-field. Since it is a full-field method, the results can be checked for overall conservation of mass.

A set of experiments has been performed on a motored four stroke engine measuring the gas phase thermal boundary layer profile adjacent to the cylinder head using speckle interferometry. Speckle interferometry is an optical technique which allows full field, line of sight averaged optical phase shift measurements. These optical phase shift measurements may be interpreted as local temperature values for planar or axisymmetric geometries with ideal gases. For this set of experiments, a small (20 mm diameter) portion of the cylinder head was raised 2 mm above the rest of the surface and used as a test surface. The experiments were performed at two engine speeds, 300 and 750 RPM and at low and high intake swirl levels. Interferograms were obtained at 10 crank angle degree intervals from 70° before top dead center of compression to 60° after top dead center of compression.