Search Results

The deterioration of combustion stability as lean operating limits and misfire conditions are approached has been investigated experimentally. The study has been carried out on spark ignition engines with port fuel injection and four-valves-per-cylinder. Test conditions cover fully-warm and cold operation, and ranges of air/fuel ratio, exhaust gas recirculation rates and spark timing. An approximate method of calculating gas/fuel ratio is described. This is used to show that combustion stability, characterised by the coefficient of variation of i.m.e.p., is a function of calculated gas/fuel ratio and spark timing until near to the limit of stability. A rapid deterioration in stability and the onset of weak, partial burning occurs at a gas/fuel ratio between 24:1 and 26:1 under fully-warm operating conditions, and around one gas/fuel ratio lower under cold operating conditions.

A method for improving three-way catalyst (TWC) performance by superimposing a low frequency lean air-to-fuel ratio (AFR)bias perturbation onto the standard AFR oscillations is described. This observation of Catalyst Regeneration (CatRegen) has been attributed to a reactivation of poisoned precious metal sites on the catalyst surface. Preliminary tests under steady-state conditions show that there is a gradual reduction in TWC activity for NOx after a lean-rich transition, suggesting a temporary poisoning of the active precious metal sites on the TWC under rich conditions. This deactivation can be prevented by periodically exposing the catalyst to lean exhaust gas; which has led to the development of the CatRegen system.

A method of predicting brake specific fuel consumption characteristics from limited specifications of engine design has been investigated. For spark ignition engines operating on homogeneous mixtures, indicated specific fuel consumption based on gross indicated power is related to compression ratio and spark timing relative to optimum values. The influence of burn rate is approximately accounted for by the differences in spark timings required to correctly phase combustion. Data from engines of contemporary design shows that indicated specific fuel consumption can be defined as a generic function of relative spark timing, mixture air/fuel ratio and exhaust gas recirculation rate. The additional information required to generate brake specific performance maps is cylinder volumetric efficiency, rubbing friction, auxiliary loads, and exhaust back pressure characteristics.