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It has been clarified that diesel fuel properties have a great effect on the exhaust emissions and fuel consumption of a conventional diesel combustion regime. And as other diesel combustion regimes are applied in order to improve exhaust emissions and fuel consumption, it can be supposed that the fuel properties also have significant effects. The purpose of this study is to propose the optimum diesel fuel properties for a premixed compression ignition (PCI) combustion regime. In this paper, the effect of the auto-ignitability of diesel fuels on exhaust emissions and fuel consumption was evaluated using a heavy-duty single-cylinder test engine. In all experiments, fuels were injected using an electronically controlled, common-rail diesel fuel injector, and most experiments were conducted under high EGR conditions in order to reduce NOx emissions.

In this study, diesel exhaust emission characteristics were investigated as GTL (Gas To Liquid) fuel was applied to a heavy-duty diesel truck which had been developed to match a Japanese new long-term exhaust emission regulation (NOx < 2.0 g/kWh, PM < 0.027 g/kWh). The results in this study show that although the test vehicle has advanced technologies (e.g. high pressure fuel injection, oxidation catalyst, and urea-SCR aftertreatment system, etc.) which are applied to reduce diesel emissions, the neat GTL fuel has a great advantage to reduce particulate matter emissions and poly aromatic hydrocarbons. And regarding nano-size PM emissions, nuclei mode particles emitted during idling are significantly decreased by using the GTL fuel.

This work aimed to develop an LPG fueled direct injection SI engine, especially in order to improve the exhaust emission quality while maintaining high thermal efficiency comparable to a conventional engine. In-cylinder direct injection engines developed recently worldwide utilizes the stratified charge formation technique at low load, whereas at high load, a close-to-homogeneous charge is formed. Thus, compared to a conventional port injection engine, a significant improvement of fuel consumption and power can be achieved. To implement such a combustion strategy, the stratification of mixture charge is very important, and an understanding of its combustion process is also inevitably necessary. In this work, a numerical simulation was performed using a CFD code (KIVA-3), where the shape of a combustion chamber, swirl intensity, injection timing and duration, etc. were varied and their effects on the mixture formation and combustion process were investigated.

In this study, measurement methods of aldehydes and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from off-road engine have been investigated. Also, their emission characteristics have been evaluated. By using high-performance liquid chromatograph (HPLC), aldehydes could be measured with small variation. Major aldehydes from off-road engine are formaldehyde and acetaldehyde. Total aldehydes emission is not necessarily low compared to THC emission. The emission characteristics of aldehydes are similar to that of CO, THC and PM. For VOCs sampling, sampling tube with absorbent was better than sampling bag because some kinds of VOCs tend to become absorbed on the sampling bag. Except for 1,3-butadiene, VOCs could be measured with small variation by using gas chromatography-mass spectrometer (GC-MS). Benzene, toluene and xylene were major species found in VOCs. The emission characteristics of VOCs were also similar to ones of CO, THC and PM.

In this study, performance and emissions characteristics of an LPG direct injection (DI) engine with a rotary distributor pump were examined by using cetane enhanced LPG fuel developed for diesel engines. Results showed that stable engine operation was possible for a wide range of engine loads. Also, engine output power with cetane enhanced LPG was comparable to diesel fuel operation. Exhaust emissions measurements showed NOx and smoke could be reduced with the cetane enhanced LPG fuel. Experimental model vehicle with an in-line plunger pump has received its license plate in June 2000 and started high-speed tests on a test course. It has already been operated more than 15,000 km without any major failure. Another, experimental model vehicle with a rotary distributor pump was developed and received its license plate to operate on public roads.

This research investigated the performance and emissions of a direct injection (DI) Diesel engine operated on 100% butane liquid petroleum gas (LPG). The LPG has a low cetane number, therefore di-tertiary-butyl peroxide (DTBP) and aliphatic hydrocarbon (AHC) were added to the LPG (100% butane) to enhance cetane number. With the cetane improver, stable Diesel engine operation over a wide range of the engine loads was possible. By changing the concentration of DTBP and AHC several different LPG blended fuels were obtained. In-cylinder visualization was also used in this research to check the combustion behavior. LPG and only AHC blended fuel showed NOX emission increased compared to Diesel fuel operation. Experimental result showed that the thermal efficiency of LPG powered Diesel engine was comparable to Diesel fuel operation. Exhaust emissions measurements showed that NOX and smoke could be considerably reduced with the blend of LPG, DTBP and AHC.

In this study, a system to perform a parameter search of heavy-duty diesel engines is proposed. Recently, it has become essential to use design methodologies including computer simulations for diesel engines that have small amounts of NOx and SOOT while maintaining reasonable fuel economy. For this purpose, multi-objective optimization techniques should be used. Multi-objective optimization problems have several types of objectives and they should be minimized or maximized at the same time. There is often a trade-off relationship between objects and derivation of the Pareto optimum solutions that express the relationship between the objects is one of the goals in this case. The proposed system consists of a multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA) and phenomenological model. MOGA has strong search capability for Pareto optimum solutions. However, MOGA requires a large number of iterations.

As an effective method to solve the global warming and the energy crisis, the research has been carried out for the adaptability of plant oil as an alternative fuel for Diesel engine. But there are the problems of engine performance and exhaust emissions owing to the high viscosity and low volatility, when the plant oil is used as a fuel. In order to eliminate these problems, spray characteristics of the DME (Dimethyl ether) blended plant oil has been examined by using the image processing based on the shadowgraph methodology. Results show that the optimum mixing ratio of the blend is about 50:50 (by weight %). Thereafter, experiments have been conducted with a DI Diesel engine using the DME blended plant oil, and compared the exhaust emissions with Diesel, DME and transesterified fuel operation. From the results, it can be concluded that the combustion characteristics of DME blended plant oil are comparable to Diesel fuel.

It is thought that the synthetic gas, including hydrogen and carbon monoxide, has a potential to be an alternative fuel for internal combustion engines, because a heating value of the synthetic gas is higher than one of hydrogen or natural gas. A purpose of this study is to acquire stable auto-ignition and combustion of the synthetic gas which is supposed to be applied into a direct-injection compression ignition engine. In this study, the effects of ambient gas temperatures and oxygen concentrations on auto-ignition characteristics of the synthetic gas with changing percentage of hydrogen (H2) or carbon monoxide (CO) concentrations in the synthetic gas. An electronically-controlled, hydraulically-actuated gas injector was used to control a precise injection timing and period of gaseous fuels, and the experiments were conducted in an optically accessible, constant-volume combustion chamber under simulated quiescent diesel engine conditions.

The measurement of the number distribution of nanometer size particles (nanoparticles) in the diesel exhaust emission is important in order to evaluate their environmental and health impact, and to develop new types of diesel particulate filters (DPFs). Generally, the distributions of diesel particulate matter are complicated in the nanometer size regime that contains some peaks depending on the various particle formation mechanisms. They are strongly influenced by the homogeneous and heterogeneous nucleation of heavy hydrocarbons in the dilution process, and nanoparticles are also generated even in the aerosol chargers used for the electrical aerosol measurement system.