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Carbon dioxide (CO2 or R744) is a promising next-generation refrigerant for mobile air-conditioning applications (MAC), which has the advantages of good heating performance in cold climates and environmental-friendly properties. This paper presents a simulation model of an integrated internal heat exchanger (IHX) and accumulator (Acc) using the finite volume method. The results are validated by a group of experimental data collected with different transcritical R744 mobile air-conditioner and heat pump (MHP) systems, and the error was within ±10%. The impacts of refrigerant mass flow rate and operating temperatures on the heat transfer rate of the IHX, improvement on refrigeration capacity and the liquid level in the Acc were studied. Results show that the net benefits of IHX are significant in AC mode, while it helps preventing flooding of the compressor in MHP mode.

Hydrogen fuel is a future energy to solve the problems of energy crisis and environmental pollution. Hydrogen internal combustion engines can combine the advantage of hydrogen without carbon pollution and the main basic structure of the traditional engines. However, the power of the port fuel injection hydrogen engines is smaller than the same volume gasoline engine because the hydrogen occupies the volume of the cylinder and reduces the air mass flow. The turbocharger can increase the power of hydrogen engines but also increase the NOx emission. Hence, a comprehensive controlling strategy to solve the contradiction of the power, BTE and NOx emission is important to improve the performance of hydrogen engines. This paper shows the controlling strategy for a four-stroke, 2.3L hydrogen engine with a turbocharger. The controlling strategy divides the operating conditions of the hydrogen engine into six parts according to the engine speeds and loads.

The presence and distribution of liquid fuel within an engine cylinder at cold start may adversely affect the hydrocarbon emissions from port-injected, spark ignition engines. Therefore, high speed videos of the liquid fuel entry into the cylinder of an optical engine were recorded in order to assess the effect of various engine operating parameters on the amount of liquid fuel inducted into the cylinder, the sizes of liquid drops present and the distribution of the fuel within the cylinder. A 2.5L, V-6, port-injected, spark ignition engine was modified so that optical access is available throughout the entire volume of one of the cylinders. A fused silica cylinder is sandwiched between the separated block and head of the engine and a “Bowditch-type” piston extension is mounted to the production piston. The Bowditch piston has a fused silica crown so that visualization is possible through the top of the piston as well as through the transparent cylinder.

Combustion processes employing different injection strategies in a High-Speed Direct Inject (HSDI) diesel engine were investigated using a narrow angle injector (70 degree). Whole-cycle combustion was visualized using a high-speed digital video camera. The liquid spray evolution process was imaged by the Mie-scattering technique. Different injection strategies were employed in this study including early pre-Top Dead Center (TDC) injection, post-TDC injection, multiple injection strategies with an early pre-TDC injection and a late post-TDC injection. Smokeless combustion was obtained under some operating conditions. Compared with the original injection angle (150 degree), some new combustion phenomena were observed for certain injection strategies. For early pre-TDC injection strategies, liquid fuel impingement is observed that results in some newly observed fuel film combustion flame (pool fires) following an HCCI-like weak flame.

Biodiesel fuel can be produced from a wide range of source materials that affect the properties of the fuel. The diesel engine has become a highly tuned power source that is sensitive to these properties. The objectives of this research were to measure and predict the key properties of biodiesel produced from a broad range of source materials to be used as inputs for combustion modeling; and second to compare the results of the model with and without the biodiesel fuel definition. Substantial differences in viscosity, surface tension, density and thermal conductivity were obtained relative to reference diesel fuels and among the different source materials. The combustion model revealed differences in the temperature and emissions of biodiesel when compared to reference diesel fuel.

An optically accessible single-cylinder high-speed direct-injection (HSDI) Diesel engine equipped with a Bosch common rail injection system was used to study the spray and combustion processes for European low sulfur diesel, bio-diesel, and their blends at different blending ratio. Influences of injection timing and fuel type on liquid fuel evolution and combustion characteristics were investigated under similar loads. The in-cylinder pressure was measured and the heat release rate was calculated. High-speed Mie-scattering technique was employed to visualize the liquid distribution and evolution. High-speed combustion video was also captured for all the studied cases using the same frame rate. NOx emissions were measured in the exhaust pipe. The experimental results indicated that for all of the conditions the heat release rate was dominated by a premixed combustion pattern and the heat release rate peak became smaller with injection timing retardation for all test fuels.

Biodiesel fuels and their blends with diesel are often used to reduce emissions from diesel engines. However, biodiesel has been shown to increase the NOx emissions. Operating a compression ignition engine in low-temperature combustion mode as well as using multiple injections can reduce NOx emissions. Experimental data for biodiesel are compared to those for diesel to show the effect of the biodiesel on the peak pressure, temperature, and emissions. Accurate prediction of biodiesel properties, combined with the KIVA 3V code, is used to investigate the combustion of biodiesel. The volume fraction of the cylinder that has temperatures greater than 2200 K is shown to directly affect the production of oxides of nitrogen. Biodiesel is shown to burn faster during the combustion events, though the ignition delay is often longer for biodiesel compared to diesel.

A numerical study of micro-explosion in multi-component droplets is presented. The homogeneous nucleation theory is used in describing the bubble generation process. A modified Rayleigh equation is then used to calculate the bubble growth rate. The breakup criterion is then determined by applying a linear stability analysis on the bubble-droplet system. After the explosion/breakup, the atomization characteristics, including Sauter mean radius and averaged velocity of the secondary droplets, are calculated from conservation equations. Micro-explosion can be enhanced by introducing biodiesel into the fuel blends of ethanol and tetradecane. Micro-explosion is more likely to occur at high ambient pressure. However, increasing the ambient temperature does not have a significant effect on micro-explosion. There exists an optimal composition in the liquid mixture for micro-explosion.

This paper presents the latest results for a new high efficiency clean diesel combustion system – Adaptive PCCI Combustion (a premixed charge compression ignition mixed-mode combustion) using a micro-variable circular orifice (MVCO) fuel injector. Key characteristics of the new combustion system such as low NOx and soot emissions, high fuel efficiency, increased engine torque are presented through KIVA simulation results. While early premixed charge compression ignition (PCCI) combustion reduces engine-out NOx and soot, it's limited to partial loads by known issues such as combustion control, high HC and CO, and high pressure rise rate, etc. Conventional combustion is well controlled diffusion combustion but comes with high NOx and soot. Leveraging the key merits of PCCI and conventional combustion in a practical engine is both meaningful and challenging.

The operation of a small bore high speed direct injection (HSDI) engine with a MVCO injector is simulated by the KIVA 3V code, developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory. The MVCO injector extends the range of injection timings over conventional injectors and it extra flexibility in designing injection schemes. Combustion from very early injection is observed with MVCO injections but not with conventional injection. This improves the fuel economy of the engine in terms of lower ISFC. Even better efficiency can be achieved by using biodiesel, which may be due to extra oxygen in the fuel improving the combustion process. Biodiesel sees a longer ignition delay for the initial injection. It also exhibits a faster burning rate and shorter combustion duration. Biodiesel also lowered both NOx and soot emissions. This is consistent with the general observation for soot emissions.

The KIVA-3V code, developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory, with modifications that improve its capability with biodiesel simulations was used to model the operation of an HSDI engine using blends of soybean biodiesel and diesel. Biodiesel and their blends with diesel are frequently used to reduce emissions from diesel engines, although previous studies showed that biodiesel may increase NOx emission. The paradox may be resolved by running the engine in low temperature combustion mode with biodiesel/diesel blends, as low temperature combustion simultaneously reduced NOx and soot. The modified KIVA code predicts the major combustion characteristics: peak combustion pressure, heat release rate and ignition timing accurately when compared with experimental measurements. It also correctly predicts the trend of NOx emissions. It was observed that the cylinder temperature distribution has a strong effect on emission levels.

The detailed mechanisms by which oxygenated diesel fuels reduce engine-out soot emissions are not well understood. The literature contains conflicting results as to whether a fuel's overall oxygen content is the only important parameter in determining its soot-reduction potential, or if oxygenate molecular structure or other variables also play significant roles. To begin to resolve this controversy, experiments were conducted at a 1200-rpm, moderate-load operating condition using a modern-technology, 4-stroke, heavy-duty DI diesel engine with optical access. Images of broadband natural luminosity (i.e., light emission without spectral filtering) from the combustion chamber, coupled with heat-release and efficiency analyses, are presented for three test-fuels. One test-fuel (denoted GE80) was oxygenated with tri-propylene glycol methyl ether; the second (denoted BM88) was oxygenated with di-butyl maleate. The overall oxygen contents of these two fuels were matched at 26% by weight.

Combustion chamber deposits in spark ignition engines act as thermal insulators and can lead to octane requirement increase. The thermal properties of deposits are not well documented, the reported thermal diffusivity values vary by two orders of magnitude. Two thermal property measurement techniques were compared, the flash and steady illumination laser methods. The steady laser method was more suitable for deposit property measurement. A comparison was made of the thermal properties of deposits grown with a base fuel with the thermal properties of deposits grown with the base fuel doped with reformer bottoms. For the clean fuel the thermal diffusivity ranged from 3.5 to 3.9-7 m2/s, at various locations around the combustion chamber. For the fuel doped with reformer bottoms the thermal diffusivity ranged from 1.1 to 1.9-7 m2/s at different locations within the combustion chamber.

Bio-butanol has been widely investigated as a promising alternative fuel. However, the main issues preventing the industrial-scale production of butanol is its relatively low production efficiency and high cost of production. Acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE), the intermediate product in the ABE fermentation process for producing bio-butanol, has attracted a lot of interest as an alternative fuel because it not only preserves the advantages of oxygenated fuels, but also lowers the cost of fuel recovery for individual component during fermentation. If ABE could be directly used for clean combustion, the separation costs would be eliminated which save an enormous amount of time and money in the production chain of bio-butanol.

Bio-butanol has been considered as a promising alternative fuel for internal combustion engines due to its advantageous physicochemical properties. However, the further development of bio-butanol is inhibited by its high recovery cost and low production efficiency. Hence, the goal of this study is to evaluate two upstream products from different fermentation processes of bio-butanol, namely acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) and isopropanol-butanol-ethanol (IBE), as alternative fuels for diesel. The experimental comparison is conducted on a single-cylinder and common-rail diesel engine under various main injection timings (MIT) and equivalent engine load (EEL) conditions. The experimental results show that ABE and IBE significantly affect the combustion phasing. The start of combustion (SOC) is retarded when ABE and IBE are mixed with diesel. Furthermore, the ABE/IBE-diesel blends are more sensitive to the changes in MIT compared with that of pure diesel.

Biodiesel is a widely used biofuel in diesel engines, which is of particular interest as a renewable fuel because it possesses the similar properties as the diesel fuel. The pure soybean biodiesel was tested in an optical constant volume combustion chamber using natural flame luminosity and forward illumination light extinction (FILE) methods to explore the combustion process and soot distribution at various ambient temperatures (800 K and 1000 K) and oxygen concentrations (21%, 16%, 10.5%). Results indicated that, with a lower ambient temperature, the autoignition delay became longer for all three oxygen concentrations and more ambient air was entrained by spray jet and more fuel was burnt by premixed combustion. With less ambient oxygen concentration, the heat release rate showed not only a longer ignition delay but also longer combustion duration.

Ignition location is one of the important factors that affect the thermal efficiency, exhaust emissions and knock sensitivity in premixed-charge ignition engines. However, the ignition initiation locations of pre-chamber generated turbulent jet ignition, which is a promising ignition enhancement method, are not clearly understood due to the complex physics behind it. Motivated by this, the ignition initiation location of a transient turbulent jet in a constant volume combustor is analyzed by the use of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. In the CFD simulations of this work, commercial codes KIVA-3 V release 2 and an in-house-developed chemical solver with a detailed mechanism for H2/air mixtures are used. Comparisons are performed between simulated and experimental ignition initiation locations, and they agree well with one another. A detailed parametric study of the influence of in-cylinder temperature on the ignition initiation location is also performed.

In-cylinder concentrations of nitric oxide (NO) in a diesel engine were studied using a laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) technique that employs two-photon excitation. Two-photon NO LIF images were acquired during the expansion and exhaust portions of the engine cycle providing useful NO fluorescence signal levels from 60° after top dead center through the end of the exhaust stroke. The engine was fueled with the oxygenated compound diethylene glycol diethyl ether to minimize soot within the combustion chamber. Results of the two-photon NO LIF technique from the exhaust portion of the cycle were compared with chemiluminescence NO exhaust-gas measurements over a range of engine loads from 1.4 to 16 bar gross indicated mean effective pressure. The overall trend of the two-photon NO LIF signal showed good qualitative agreement with the NO exhaust-gas measurements.

As engine researchers are facing the task of designing more powerful, more fuel efficient and less polluting engines, a large amount of research has been focused towards homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI) operation for diesel engines. Ignition timing of HCCI operation is controlled by a number of factors including intake temperatures, exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) and injection timing to name a few. This study focuses on the computational modeling of an optically accessible high-speed direct-injection (HSDI) small bore diesel engine. In order to capture the phenomena of HCCI operation, the KIVA computational code package has been outfitted with an improved and optimized Shell autoignition model, the extended Zeldovich thermal NOx model, and soot formation and oxidation models. With the above named models in place, several cases were computed and compared to experimentally measured data and captured images of the DIATA test engine.

Cylinder head combustion chamber and piston temperatures and heat fluxes were measured in a 2.2 L 4 cylinder spark ignition engine. Measurements for the combustion chamber were made at wide open throttle conditions, 1400 rpm to 5000 rpm at 600 rpm increments, additional measurements were made on the combustion chamber at part throttle conditions at 3200 RPM. Piston temperature and heat flux measurements were made at WOT conditions from 1400 to 3200 RPM in 600 RPM increments. Average combustion chamber surface temperatures ranged from 130 deg. C to 248 deg. C, while peak combustion chamber surface temperatures ranged from 142 deg. C to 258 deg. C for WOT conditions. Peak heat flus at the surface for WOT conditions in the combustion chamber ranged from 1.2 MW/m2to 5.0 MW/m2. Central region heat fluxes were 2.3 to 2.8 times greater than those in the end gas regions of the combustion chamber.