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Natural gas is a promising alternative fuel as it is affordable, available worldwide, has high knock resistance and low carbon content. This study focuses on the combustion visualization of spark ignition combustion in an optical single cylinder engine using natural gas at several air to fuel ratios and speed-load operating points. In addition, Turbulent Jet Ignition optical images are compared to the baseline spark ignition images at the world-wide mapping point (1500 rev/min, 3.3 bar IMEPn) in order to provide insight into the relatively unknown phenomenon of Turbulent Jet Ignition combustion. Turbulent Jet Ignition is an advanced spark initiated pre-chamber combustion system for otherwise standard spark ignition engines found in current passenger vehicles. This next generation pre-chamber design simply replaces the spark plug in a conventional spark ignition engine.

This study focuses on the combustion visualization of spark ignition combustion in an optical single cylinder engine using natural gas and propane at several air to fuel ratios and speed-load operating points. Propane and natural gas fuels were compared as they are the most promising gaseous alternative fuels for reciprocating powertrains, with both fuels beginning to find wide market penetration on the fleet level across many regions of the world. Additionally, when compared to gasoline, these gaseous fuels are affordable, have high knock resistance and relatively low carbon content and they do not suffer from the complex re-fueling and storage problems associated with hydrogen.