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Currently, diesel engine-out exhaust NOx emission level prediction is a major challenge for complying with the stricter emission legislation and for control purpose of the after-treatment system. Most of the NOx prediction research is based on the Zeldovich thermal mechanism, which is reasonable from the physical point of view and for its simplicity. Nevertheless, there are some predictable range limitations, such as low temperature with high EGR rate operating conditions or high temperature with low EGR rates. In the present paper, 3 additional considerations, pilot burned gas mixing before the main injection; major NO formation area; concentration correction, were applied to the previously developed real-time NO estimation model based on in-cylinder pressure and data available from ECU. The model improvement was verified on a 1.6 liter EURO5 diesel engine in both steady and transient operation.

High pressure fuel injection systems, such as common rail (CR) systems and electronically-controlled unit injector (EUI) systems, have been widely applied to modern heavy duty diesel engines. They are shown to be very effective for achieving high power density with high fuel efficiency and low exhaust gas emissions. However, the increased peak combustion pressure gives additional structural stress and thermal load to engine structure. Thus, proper material selection and thermal analysis of engine components are essential in order to meet the durability requirements of heavy-duty diesel engines adopting a high pressure injection system. In this paper, thermal analysis of a 12.9 ℓ diesel engine with an EUI system was studied. Temperatures were measured on a cylinder head, a piston and a cylinder liner. A specially designed linkage system was used to measure the piston temperatures. A radio-tracer technique was also used to verify the rotation of piston rings.

To simulate the car-to-car crash accidents in the real field, the Autonomous Driving System was developed. This system consists of communicating, sensing, accelerating, braking, steering and data recording subsystems. All these were designed to be compact, light and collapsible, so that the crash characteristics of test vehicle were not affected. The velocity performance of the system covers from 10 kph to 100 kph within ± 0.5 kph error, and the lateral deviation is constrained within ± 20 mm. With this system, several frontal offset and side car-to-car crash tests were carried out successfully. Deformations, injury levels, deceleration signals and dynamic behaviors during crash were typically investigated. And the dynamic behaviors were compared with the simulation results of EDSMAC. Car-to-car crash tests between small and large vehicles with different masses were carried out and the effects on the compatibility were investigated.

There have been strong moves in recent years to introduce the metal matrix composites concept into higher volume applications, notably the automotive field where large volume production and lower material costs are required. The wettability between reinforcing materials and base material is one of important factors for the strength of composites and its manufacture. The main objective of this paper is to establish a basic understanding of wetting phenomena in SiC/liquid aluminum and aluminum alloy systems. In the present paper, results from the sessile drop method are reported for the effects on the wetting angle, θ, of free silicon in the silicon carbide substrate and of alloying additions of silicon, copper or magnesium to the aluminum drop for the temperature range 700-900 or 1400°C in the titanium-gettered vacuum (1.3 x 10-2 / 1.3 x 10-3 Pa).

In order to meet FMVSS 201 (U) requirements, the upper vehicle interior structures with trim in a vehicle need to be properly designed to minimize injuries when head impacts these components. This paper presents a study of countermeasures in pillars using FEA approach by considering some design factors. Optimal designs are then selected for interior head impact protection based on CAE analysis using LS-DYNA non-linear finite element code.

Fuel tank in vehicle must hold the fuel in a stable way under any driving condition. However, the fuel tank might not conserve the fuel firmly in case a crack emerged while the fuel tank is exposed to different driving condition. Basically, when the engine is in purging at a normal ambient temperature before fuel boiling, the pressure inside the fuel tank decreases. However, the pressure inside a fuel tank increases while a vehicle is driven at extreme hot ambient temperature as fuel is boiling. This repetitive pressure change in the fuel tank comes with fuel tank’s physical expansion and shrink, which would cause a damage to the fuel tank. The main purpose of this research is to investigate the root cause of why fuel tank cracks at a fatigue point. We also aim to set up the method of how to test durability of the fuel tank in association with the pressure inside the tank.

Invisible Passenger-side Airbag (IPAB) door systems must be designed with a weakened area such that the airbag will break through the Instrument Panel (IP) in the intended manner, with no flying debris at any temperature. A predictive Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was carried out to calculate the effects of varying design factors (the length and thickness of kink-hinge, tear-line type and temperature) on the IPAB-door opening. The impact performance of plastic parts was considered, because the mechanical properties of thermoplastic materials are strongly dependent on strain rate.

In this study, a series of tests have been carried out to evaluate the effects of the injection rate and timing on bsfc, NOx, and PM emissions in a heavy-duty diesel engine with TICS FIE system. Injection line pressure, cylinder pressure, NOx and smoke were measured with various injection times and injection rates. The injection rate was altered at a fixed injection timing, which could be realized either by changing the TICS setting time or by using different cam profiles. The injection time was varied by using TICS timing control function at a given setting time. A parametric study of the injection rate in in-line pump system was tried to correlate injection rate variations with combustion characteristics and emission. Two parameters, the injection pressure rising rate and the initially injected fuel quantity were introduced to characterize fuel injection.

The effects of tempering on carburized Cr-Mo gear steel were investigated through mechanical and fatigue tests. Specimens were carburized at 900°C for 180 minutes, and then oil quenched at 150°C for 10 minutes of holding time and cooled to room temperature. The subsequent tempering process was performed to 160°C for 90 minutes. Surface hardness and residual compressive stress were decreased by tempering treatment, whereas tensile strength, yield strength and impact energy were increased. Bending fatigue endurance limits for both tempered and untempered specimens were same as 779MPa. The strength of roller contact fatigue is also not greatly influenced by tempering treatment. Thermal distortion for carburized transfer driven gear before and after tempering exhibited a similar distribution. Microstructural changes during tempering were also discussed.

In order to investigate the characteristics of top ring groove deposit formation in gasoline and diesel engine, engine test and simulation test were performed. From component analysis of used oils sampled from actual running engines, oxidation and nitration for gasoline engine and soot content for diesel engine were selected as main parameters for evaluating oil degradation. In gasoline engine, deposit formation increases linearly with oxidation and nitration, and especially, oil oxidation is a dominant factor on the deposit formation rather than nitration. And, deposit formation increases gradually in low temperature ranges below 260°C even if oils are highly oxidized, but it increases rapidly if piston top ring groove temperature is above 260°C. In diesel engine, deposit formation is highly related to soot content in lubricating oils.

Given the importance of vehicle safety, OEMs are focused on ensuring the safety of passengers during car accidents. Injury is related to the passenger’s kinematics and interaction with airbag, seatbelt, and vehicle drop. However, the correlation between vehicle drop (vehicle pitch) and passengers’ injury is the main issue recently being discussed. This paper presents the definition of vehicle drop and analyzes the relationship through a dynamic sled test. This study defines the relationship between individual vehicle systems (body, chassis, tire, etc.) and vehicle drop, and how to control the amount of vehicle drop to minimize the injury of passengers.

This paper describes how to meet LEVII ULEV70 emission standards and minimize fuel consumption with the combined NOx after-treatment (LNT+SCR) system for diesel vehicles. Through analysis of LNT's functionality and characteristics in a LNT+SCR combined after-treatment system, allowed a new control strategy to be established, different from the existing LNT-only system. In the 200°C or higher condition where SCR can provide the most stable NOx conversion efficiency, rich regeneration of LNT was optimized to minimize LNT deterioration and fuel consumption. Optimized mapping between rapid heat up strategy and raw NOx reduction maximized LNT's NOx conversion efficiency during the intervals when it is not possible for SCR to purify NOx This study used bench aged catalysts which were equivalent to 150K full useful life.

In an effort to protect the earth''s environment emission regulations in the diesel engine field are becoming increasingly strict. Especially, free acceleration smoke is one of the major concerns because it not only affects the perception for the clearance of diesel engines, but also is regulated by emission legislations. In this report, we will describe how various engine parameters effect the free acceleration smoke and also describe how we can optimize a startability of vehicle simultaneously with the reduction of smoke.

Due to technological evolutions and social demands, motor vehicles are requested to be enhanced in terms of occupant safety and comfort. As a result, many countries are reinforcing crash regulations and new car assessment programs. Automotive seats are essential parts for providing passenger safety and comfort and have become most important. Many automotive companies concentrate on optimization of the seat structure. This paper presents an overview of the recent evolution of the seat structures and gives a development procedure covering seat frame design, optimization and validation. Through the study, a competitive frame design is drawn as a case result and a design guideline and a standard development procedure is established

In recent years, emission regulations have been getting increasingly strict. In the development of engines that comply with these regulations, in-cylinder pressure plays a fundamental role, as it is necessary to analyze combustion characteristics and control combustion-related parameters. The analysis of in-cylinder pressure data enables the modelling of exhaust emissions in which characteristic temperature can be derived from the in-cylinder pressure, and the pressure can be used for other investigations, such as optimizing efficiency and emissions through controlling combustion. Therefore, a piezoelectric pressure sensor to measure in-cylinder pressure is an essential element in the engine research field. However, it is difficult to practice the installation of this pressure sensor on all engines and on-road vehicles owing to cost issues.

The paper describes an engineering project carried out to optimize the crashworthiness of an existing passenger car for frontal crash using a procedure relying on numerical simulation. An optimization target is defined in terms of an ideal acceleration pulse at the seats anchors. The acceleration time history and structural members are scanned in parallel to correlate the local acceleration peaks to specific structural members. Members details are iteratively modified in order to alter the accelerations and get closer to the target.

Due to improvements in vehicle powertrain performance, friction material fade performance is becoming an important topic. For this reason, needs for studies to improve thermal characteristics of the brake system is increasing. Methods for improving the fade characteristics have several ways to improve the thermal characteristic of friction materials and increase disc capacity. However, increasing disc capacity(size) have some risk of weight and cost rise, and friction factor improvements in friction material tend to cause other problems, such as increasing squeal wire brush noise and increasing metal pick up on disc surface. Therefore, a slot disc study is needed to overcome the problems discussed previously. Currently, there is few research history for slot disc related to fade and metal pickup improvements.

Numerical investigation of engine performance and emissions of a six-stroke gasoline compression ignition (GCI) engine combustion at low load conditions is presented. In order to identify the effects of additional two strokes of the six-stroke engine cycle on the thermal and chemical conditions of charge mixtures, an in-house multi-dimensional CFD code coupled with high fidelity physical sub-models along with the Chemkin library was employed. The combustion and emissions were calculated using a reduced chemical kinetics mechanism for a 14-component gasoline surrogate fuel. Two power strokes per cycle were achieved using multiple injections during compression strokes. Parametric variations of injection strategy viz., individual injection timing for both the power strokes and the split ratio that enable the control of combustion phasing of both the power strokes were explored.

The objective of this study is to investigate mechanical properties and fatigue crack propagation behavior in hybrid metal matrix composites by squeeze infiltration method (15% Al2O3 + SiCw/6061Al). The mechanical properties of Al2O3+SiCw/Al composites including tensile strength, yield strength, Young's modulus, were improved compared with those of unreinforced alloy and Al203/Al composites. The hybrid composites were more ductile than Al2O3/Al composites. Fatigue crack propagation rates of both Al2O3/Al and Al2O3+SiCw/Al composites showed a similar behavior in region II. Their propagation rates were higher in entire ▵K region compared with that of 6061 Al alloy. From the crack path morphology, fatigue cracks propagated linearly and smoothly in 6061 Al alloy. However, in the metal matrix composites cracks tend to avoid the reinforcements promoting crack deflection. It was observed that crack deflection enhanced crack closure due to wedging phenomenon.