Search Results

Previous studies have shown Late Intake Valve Closure (LIVC) through Variable Valve Timing (VVT) to offer reduced fuel consumption through reduced pumping work. Load modulation through the controlled phasing of one of two intake valves/cylinder is one means of accomplishing the LIVC strategy on a multi-valve engine. Experimental studies of LIVC show that cycle-to-cycle variations and reduced flame velocity in single or synchronized multiple intake valve engines are associated with performance which, though superior to throttled engine performance, falls short of its promised fuel economy. To examine if the higher mixture velocity promised by valve phasing relative to single or synchronized LIVC mitigates cycle-to-cycle variations and flame velocity defects, a modification of the Quad 4 engine has been designed and built and is, at the present writing, being tested. The design employs a third camshaft placed above the original intake valve camshaft.

A two-dimensional optimization process which simultaneously adjusts the spark timing and air-fuel ratio of a lean-burn natural gas fueled engine has been demonstrated. This has been done by first mapping the thermal efficiency against spark timing and equivalence ratio at a single speed and load combination to obtain the 3-D surface of efficiency versus the other two variables. Then the ability of the control system to find and hold the combination of timing and air-fuel ratio which gives the highest thermal efficiency was explored. The control system described in SAE Paper No. 940546 was used to map the thermal efficiency versus equivalence ratio and ignition timing. NOx, CO, and HC maps were also obtained to determine the tradeoffs between efficiency and emissions. A load corresponding to a brake mean effective pressure of 0.467 MPa was maintained by a water brake dynamometer. A speed of 2000 rpm was maintained by a fuel-controlled governor.

A system was designed for controlling fuel injection and ignition timing for use on a port fuel injected, gas-fueled engine. Inputs required for the system include manifold absolute pressure, manifold air temperature, a once per revolution crankshaft pulse, a once per cycle camshaft pulse, and a relative encoder pulse train to determine crank angle. A prototype card installed in the computer contains counters and discrete logic which control the timing of ignition and injection events. High current drivers used to control the fuel injector solenoids and coil primary current are optically isolated from the computer by the use of fiber optic cables. The programming is done in QuickBASIC running in real time on a 25 MHz 80486 personal computer. The system was used to control a gas-fueled spark ignition engine at various conditions to map the torque versus air-fuel ratio and ignition timing. Each surface was mapped for a given fuel flow and speed.

This paper quantifies typical United States in-vehicle cowl area particulate filter parameters such as temperature, humidity and environmental conditions. Secondly, United States and Germany particulate filter fleet results will be included to help quantify the effect of loading on electret nonwoven particulate filter fractional efficiency and demonstrate the amount and types of particulate matter captured. Finally the paper will address the low submicron fractional filter efficiency of a simulated production “wet and dry” plate-fin automotive evaporator core.

This report describes tests of a fuel additive in a medium-duty, high-swirl, direct-injection diesel engine. The additive was found to have little influence on general combustion performance or on NOx emissions. On the other hand, it had a profound effect on particulate emissions. This was most clear under high load where particle emissions are highest. Here, when the engine was switched from running on the base fuel to the additive treated fuel, particle emissions at first increased and then fell to levels about 40% lower (by particle volume) than those initially produced by the base fuel. The additive had a long lasting effect. After running with the additive for about 25 hours, emission levels with the base fuel were only slightly higher than those with the additive treated fuel. We believe that the additive action is associated with a combination of cleaning and surface conditioning. More work should be done to understand the relative importance of these two mechanisms.

Results of three-dimensional computations of non-vaporizing and vaporizing Diesel sprays in a very high pressure (up to 18.4 MPa without combustion) environment are presented. These pressures and corresponding density ratios of ambient gas to injected liquid are about a factor of two greater than those in current Diesel engines. The spray model incorporates a line source for drops, heat, mass and momentum exchange between the gas and liquid phases, turbulent dispersion of drops, collisions and coalescences, and drop breakup. The accuracy of the model is assessed by making comparisons of computed and measured spray penetrations. Reasonable agreement is obtained for a broad range of conditions. A scaling for time and axial distance clarifies these results.

A system has been developed that allows near real time measurements of total, volatile, and nonvolatile particle concentrations in engine exhaust. It consists of a short section of heated catalyst, a cooling coil, and an electrical aerosol analyzer. The performance of this catalytic stripper system has been characterized with nonvolatile (NaCl), volatile sulfate ((NH4)2 SO4), and volatile hydrocarbon (engine oil) particles with diameters ranging from 0.05-0.5 μm. The operating temperature of 300°C gives essentially complete removal of volatile sulfate and hydrocarbon particles, but also leads to removal of 15-25% of solid particles. This system has been used to determine total, volatile, and nonvolatile particle concentrations in the exhaust of a Diesel engine and a spark ignition engine. Volatile volume fractions measured in Diesel exhaust with the catalytic stripper system increased from 19-65% as the equivalence ratio (load) decreased from 0.64-0.13.

As part of an ongoing program to control the emissions of diesel-powered equipment used in underground mines, the U. S. Bureau of Mines evaluated exhaust emissions from a compression ignition engine using oxygenated diesel fuels and a diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC). The fuels include neat (100%) soy methyl ester (SME), and a blend of 30% SME (by volume) with 70% petroleum diesel fuel. A Caterpillar 3304 PCNA engine was tested for approximately 50 hours on each fuel. Compared with commercial low-sulfur diesel fuel (D2), neat SME increased volatile organic diesel particulate matter (DPM) but greatly decreased non-volatile DPM, for a net decrease in total DPM. The DOC further reduced volatile and total DPM NOx emissions were slightly reduced for the case of neat SME, but otherwise were not significantly affected. Peak brake power decreased 9% and brake specific fuel consumption increased 13 to 14% for the neat methyl soyate because of its lower energy content compared with D2.

Results of two- and three-dimensional computations of combustion of Diesel sprays in a very high-pressure chamber are presented. A wide range of experimental conditions are considered. Peak chamber pressure with combustion range from about 6.0 MPa to about 20 MPa. Computed and measured spray penetrations and chamber pressures are compared and shown to be in adequate agreement. Autoignition is modeled using an equation for a progress variable which measures the local and instantaneous tendency of the fuel to autoignite. High temperature chemistry is modeled using a local equilibrium model coupled to a combination of laminar and turbulent characteristic times. It is shown that scaling rules which were found to apply in vaporizing and non-vaporizing sprays also apply in the combusting sprays. The fuel-air mixing rates and burning rates increase as the ratio of the ambient density to injected density increases.

Results of comparisons of computed and measured soot and NO in a direct-injection Diesel engine are presented. The computations are carried out using a three-dimensional model for flows, sprays and combustion in Diesel engines. Autoignition of the Diesel spray is modeled using an equation for a progress variable which measures the local and instantaneous tendency of the fuel to autoignite. High temperature chemistry is modeled using a local chemical equilibrium model coupled to a combination of laminar kinetic and turbulent characteristic times. Soot formation is kinetically controlled and soot oxidation is represented by a model which has a combination of laminar kinetic and turbulent mixing times. Soot oxidation appears to be controlled near top-dead-center by mixing and by kinetics as the exhaust is approached. NO is modeled using the Zeldovich mechanism.

Particulate emissions from heavy-duty buses were measured in real time under conditions encountered during the standard Central Business District (CBD) driving cycle. The buses tested were equipped with 1994 Detroit Diesel Engine Corporation 6V92-TA engines, and some included after treatment devices on the exhaust. Instantaneous, time-resolved measurements of CO2 and amorphous carbon concentrations were obtained using an optical extinction technique and compared to simultaneous results obtained using conventional dilution tunnel sampling methods. Good agreement was obtained between the real-time extinction measurements and the diluted CO2 and cycle-integrated filter measurements. The instantaneous measurements revealed that acceleration transients accounted for roughly 80% of the particulate mass emitted during the cycle but only about 45% of the fuel consumption.

Low emission heavy-duty diesel engines are increasingly utilizing four-valve designs with vertical central injectors. However, two-valve DI diesel engines with inclined injectors offset from the centerline of the piston bowl are likely to continue to be used in medium and light duty applications for some time. In such situations, designing of the hole-type nozzle is very difficult and may cause unavoidable back-drilling problems. The purpose of this paper is to solve back-drilling problems connected with hole-type nozzles and improve fuel-air mixing which leads to more efficient combustion. Based on geometric considerations, this paper introduces single-cone hole-type nozzles, double-cone hole-type nozzles, and the critical principal angles for hole-type nozzles. The single-cone hole-type nozzles and double-cone hole-type nozzles can meet requirements for height of the spray impingement points and spray orifice distribution angle at the same time.

Two types of in-cylinder optical probes were applied to a single cylinder CFR engine to detect knocking combustion. The first probe was integrated directly into the engine spark plug to monitor the radiation from burned gas in the combustion process. The second was built into a steel body and installed near the end gas region of the combustion chamber. It measured the radiant emission from the end gas in which knock originates. The measurements were centered in the near infrared region because thermal radiation from the combustion products was believed to be the main source of radiation from a spark ignition engine. As a result, ordinary photo detectors can be applied to the system to reduce its cost and complexity. It was found that the measured luminous intensity was strongly dependent upon the location of the optical sensor.

The function of the engine air cleaning filter is to remove the particulate matter in the intake air to protect the engine and its components from wear and contamination. For a specific filter, the efficiency is a function of the size of the particles being collected and the air flow velocity through the filter. Traditional tests of engine air cleaners are based on the use of specific test dusts, such as the AC Coarse and AC Fine, to determine the mass collection efficiency. However, they do not provide information on the size dependent performance of the filters, and the variation in filter performance under different particle challenge conditions. The use of a fractional efficiency test method will help to provide this missing information. The purpose of this paper is to describe a fractional efficiency test system that has been designed to evaluate the fractional cleaning efficiency of engine air cleaning filters in the size range between 0.3 and 10 mm particle diameter.

The purpose of this study is to compare the dust loading behavior of ten filter media. The filters are used in engine air filtration, self-cleaning industrial air cleaners, building heating ventilation and cooling (HVAC), automotive cabin air filtration, air respirators, and general purpose air cleaning. Several types of filter media are tested. The filters include cellulose, synthetic (felt), glass, dual-layered glass/cellulose, mixed synthetic/glass, gradient packing glass, and electrically charged fibers. The initial pressure drops and fractional collection efficiencies as a function of particle size are reported. The filters were evaluated with two test dusts to investigate the size-dependent dust loading behavior. The two test dusts are SAE fine and submicron alumina powder (median diameter 0.25 μm). The results are analyzed and compared. It was found that the cellulose filters exhibited surface loading behavior and have the fastest growth of pressure drops.

The dust holding capacity of air cleaning filter depends on the size distribution of the particles. Traditional test dusts like Arizona road dust consist of a single mode of coarse particles. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the dust holding capacities of air filters with a bi-modal test dust that simulates the dust in atmospheric environments. The fine mode of the test dust consists of submicron Alumina particles that represent the fine particles in atmosphere. The coarse mode consists of traditional AC fine dust. The fine and coarse dusts are mixed in different mass ratios to simulate different atmospheric conditions. The ratios are 100% fine, 50%/50%, 25%/75%, 10%/90%, and 100% coarse. An engine air filter and a HVAC filter were studied with the bi-modal test dusts. The filter pressure drops were measured as a function of the dust loading. The results show that the flow resistance rises significantly faster as the ratio of fine to coarse fraction increases.

Cruise control is one of the most critical issues that manufacturers concern about. But last many researches just focused on engine side control with general step transmission. Continuously Variable Transmissions (CVT) can cover a wide range of ratios continuously. This makes it possible to operate a combustion engine in more efficient working points than stepped transmission. With this merit, fuel optimal cruise control by CVT ratio control is possible with precise longitudinal dynamic model. Estimation of longitudinal load such as road slope and rolling resistance is essential for precise cruise control of automotive vehicle. In this paper, using model based road slope estimation method with gravity sensor, precise longitudinal dynamic model of automotive vehicle is presented. Real-time adaptive algorithm is also implemented for detecting external driving condition change and compensating bias of g-sensor.

Alcohols are examined as supplemental carbureted fuels for highspeed turbocharged diesels as typified by the White Motor/Waukesha F310 DBLT (6 cylinder, 310 cu. in.). Most of the work was with methanol; ethanol and isopropanol were compared at a few points. Fumigation (dual-fueling) with alcohol significantly reduced smoke and intake manifold temperature. These effects were largest at high load. Efficiency and HC emissions were essentially unchanged. Cylinder pressures and rise rates were examined for possible adverse effects on engine structure. The range of speed and load favorable to alcohol dual-fueling are such that, should alcohols become economically competitive as fuels, a practical duel-fuel system could be applied to existing diesel engines.

Combustion characteristics of an L-head engine combustion chamber have been examined using ionization probes and piezioelectric pressure transducers. The method describes how pressure rise rates, peak pressures, mean effective pressures, and flame arrival times were recorded. The flame arrival times were then used to find the position and shape of the flame front as a function of time. The influence of spark plug location on the above parameters was then examined for two different combustion chamber shapes.

The correlations between the physical properties and autoignition parameters of several alternate fuels have been examined. The fuels are DF-2 and its blends with petroleum derived fuels, coal derived fuels, shale derived fuels, high aromatic naphtha sun-flower oils, methanol and ethanol. A total of eighteen existing correlations are discussed. An emphasis is made on the suitability of each of the correlations for the development of electronic controls for diesel engines when run on alternate fuels. A new correlation has been developed between the cetane number of the fuels and its kinematic viscosity and specific gravity.