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A physically based simulation program developed by IAV makes a notable reduction of test bed measurements for the calibration of the cylinder charge calculation possible. Based upon geometric engine parameters and camshaft profiles, the cylinder charge is calculated from thermodynamic relationships taking into account the contribution of residual gas. After successful engine-specific calibration of the simulation model on the basis of a reduced set of test bed measurements, it is possible to calculate the cylinder air mass over the entire range of valve timing settings and operating points (engine load and speed). The simulation-generated “virtual” measurements can then be used for calibration of the control unit software over the entire operating range.

As more virtual product development is integrated into the mass-production development process and overall development times are shortened, efficient intake-port design requires closer cooperation between design, simulation and test engineers. Doppler Global Velocimetry (DGV) has become an important link in the overall intake-port development process as it provides 3D-vector fields of flow velocity. Hence, it can be used to make direct comparisons with 3D-CFD-simulation results. The present paper describes the hardware-assisted inlet port development process for diesel engines, the cooperation among port design, 3D-CFD-simulation with the creation of alternative geometries and DGV flow-measurement of preferred variants with their capability of checking and improving simulation results.

Over the last decade, many methods have been proposed for estimating the in-cylinder combustion pressure or the torque from instantaneous crankshaft speed measurements. However, such approaches are typically computationally expensive. In this paper, an entirely different approach is presented to allow the real-time estimation of the in-cylinder pressures based on crankshaft speed measurements. The technical implementation of the method will be presented, as well as extensive results obtained for a V-6 S.I. engine while varying spark timing, engine speed, engine load and EGR. The method allows to estimate the in-cylinder pressure with an average estimation error of the order of 1 to 2% of the peak pressure. It is very general in its formulation, is statistically robust in the presence of noise, and computationally inexpensive.

This paper presents the development of a model-based air/fuel ratio controller for a high performance engine that uses, in addition to other usual signals, the throttle angle to enable predictive air mass flow rate estimation. The objective of the paper is to evaluate the possibility to achieve a finer air/fuel ratio control during transients that involve sudden variations in the physical conditions inside the intake manifold, due, for example, to fast throttle opening or closing actions. The air mass flow rate toward the engine cylinders undertakes strong variation in such transients, and its correct estimation becomes critical mainly because of the time lag between its evaluation and the instant when the air actually enters the cylinders.

Charge motion is known to accelerate and stabilize combustion through its influence on turbulence intensity and flame propagation. The present work investigates the effect of charge motion generated by intake runner blockages on combustion characteristics and emissions under part-load conditions in SI engines. Firing experiments have been conducted on a DaimlerChrysler (DC) 2.4L 4-valve I4 engine, with spark range extending around the Maximum Brake Torque (MBT) timing. Three blockages with 20% open area are compared to the fully open baseline case under two operating conditions: 2.41 bar brake mean effective pressure (bmep) at 1600 rpm, and 0.78 bar bmep at 1200 rpm. The blocked areas are shaped to create different levels of swirl, tumble, and cross-tumble. Crank-angle resolved pressures have been acquired, including cylinders 1 and 4, intake runners 1 and 4 upstream and downstream of the blockage, and exhaust runners 1 and 4.

During the last years the deep re-examination of the engine design for lowering engine emissions involved two-wheel vehicles too. The IC engine overall efficiency plays a fundamental role in determining final raw emissions. From this point of view, the optimization of the in-cylinder flow organization is mandatory. In detail, in SI engines the generation of a coherent tumble vortex having dimensions comparable to the engine stroke could be of primary importance to extend the engines' ignition limits toward the field of the dilute/lean mixtures. For motorbike and motor scooter applications, the optimization of the tumble generation is considered an effective way to improve the combustion system efficiency and to lower emissions, considering also that the two-wheels layout represents an obstacle in adopting the advanced post-treatment concepts designed for automotive applications.

Still today, two-stroke engine layout is characterized by a wide share on the market thanks to its simpler construction that allows to reduce production and maintenance costs respecting the four-stroke engine. Two of the main application areas for the two-stroke engines are on small motorbikes and on handheld machines like chainsaws, brush cutters, and blowers. In both these application areas, two-stroke engines are generally equipped by a carburettor to provide the air/fuel mixture formation while the engine cooling is assured by forcing an air stream all around the engine head and cylinder surfaces. Focusing the attention on the two-stroke air-cooling system, it is not easy to assure its effectiveness all around the cylinder surface because the air flow easily separates from the cylinder walls producing local hot-spots on the cylinder itself. This problem can be bounded only by the optimization of the cylinder fin design placed externally to the cylinder surface.

A physics-based simulation program developed by IAV is used to calibrate the torque structure and cylinder charge calculation in the electronic control unit of SI engines. The model calculates both the charge cycle and combustion phase based on flow mechanics and a fractal combustion model. Once the air mass in the charge cycle has been computed, a fractal combustion model is used for the ongoing calculation of cylinder pressure and temperature. The progression of cylinder pressure over the high and low-pressure phases also provides information on engine torque. Following the engine-specific calibration of the model using elemental geometric information and reduced test bench measurements, the physical engine properties can be simulated over the operating cycle. The calibrated model allows simulations to be carried out at all operating points and the results to be treated as virtual test bench measurements.

Recent years have witnessed a dramatic increase in global ethanol production, while cellulosic feedstock or the algae-based production approach make more sustainable ethanol production foreseeable in many countries. The ethanol produced will increasingly penetrate the markets not only as blending component, but also as main fuel component, boosting demand for flex-fuel vehicles. One of the main challenges for flex-fuel vehicles is the cold start due to the poor vapor pressure of ethanol. This is detrimental to starting capability in DISI engines in particular, with increased cylinder wall wetting causing higher oil dilution. The most efficient solution for DISI engines is a smart injection strategy, enabling fuel vaporization during injection in the compression stroke. But this requires optimum injection parameters such as injection timing, split ratio and rail pressure.

Shaped elastomeric joints such as engine mounts or suspension bushings undergo broadband, multi-axis loading; however, in practice, the elastomeric joint properties are often measured at stepped single frequencies (non-resonant test method). This article helps provide insight into multi-axis properties with new benchmark experiments that are designed to permit direct comparison between system resonant and non-resonant identification methods of the dynamic stiffness matrices of elastomeric joints, including multi-axis (non-diagonal) terms. The joints are constructed with combinations of inclined elastomeric cylinders to control non-diagonal terms in the stiffness matrix. The resonant experiment consists of an elastic metal beam end-supported by elastomeric joints coupling the in-plane transverse and longitudinal beam motion.

Mixture formation in gasoline direct-injection engines is largely determined by the quality of injection. Injection systems with a wide range of layouts are used today in enhancing spray quality. As parameters, the pressure and temperature of injected fuel play a crucial part in defining quality. The effect increasing pressure has on the quality of spray is basically known. So are ways of applying this process to gasoline fuel. The effect of massively increasing the temperature of injected fuel - to the point of reaching supercritical conditions - in contrast, is not known in any detail. For this reason, the following paper focuses attention on examining the fundamental influence of increasing fuel temperature from 25 °C to 450 °C on the spray behavior of a high-pressure injector with a GDI nozzle. Combining relevant levels of pressure and temperature, discussion also turns to supercritical fuel conditions and their effects on spray behavior.

Specific shifting of load points is an important approach in order to reduce the fuel consumption of gasoline engines. A potential measure is cylinder deactivation, which is used as a study example. Currently CO2 savings of new concepts are evaluated by dynamic cycles simulations. The fuel consumption during driving cycles is calculated based on consumption-optimized steady-state engine maps. Discrete load point shifts occur as shifts within maps. For reasons of comfort shifts require neutral torque. The work of deactivated cylinders must be compensated by active cylinders within one working cycle. Due to the larger time constant of the air path the air charge must be increased or decreased in order to deactivate or activate cylinders without affecting the torque. A working-cycle-resolved, continuously variable parameter is prerequisite for process control. Manipulation of ignition timing enables a reduction of efficiency and gained work.

The introduction of tumble into the combustion chamber is an effective method of enhancing turbulence intensity prior to ignition, thereby accelerating the burn rates, stabilizing the combustion, and extending the dilution limit. In this study, the primary intake runners are partially blocked to produce different levels of tumble motion in the cylinder during the air induction process. Experiments have been performed with a Chrysler 2.4L 4-valve I4 engine at maximum brake torque timing under two operating conditions: 2.41 bar brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) at 1600 rpm, and 0.78 bar BMEP at 1200 rpm. A method has been developed to quantify the tumble characteristics of blockages under steady flow conditions in a flow laboratory, by using the same cylinder head, intake manifold, and tumble blockages from the engine experiments.

Flow fields and fuel distribution play a critical role in developing the combustion process inside the cylinders of piston engines. This has prompted the development of measurement and diagnostic capabilities including laser techniques like Doppler Global Velocimetry (DGV). The paper provides an overview of the basics of DGV and the type of results that can be obtained. It also includes a short comparison to Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) which is a popular alternative method. Furthermore, it is shown that DGV can be used simultaneously in combination with droplet distribution visualization inside cylinders based on Mie scattering.

The most recent European regulations for two- and three-wheelers (Euro 5) are imposing an enhanced combustion control in motorcycle engines to respect tighter emission limits, and Air-Fuel Ratio (AFR) closed-loop control has become a key function of the engine management system also for this type of applications. In a multi-cylinder engine, typically only one oxygen sensor is installed on each bank, so that the mean AFR of two or more cylinders rather than the single cylinder one is actually controlled. The installation of one sensor per cylinder is normally avoided due to cost, layout and reliability issues. In the last years, several studies were presented to demonstrate the feasibility of an individual AFR controller based on a single sensor. These solutions are based on the mathematical modelling of the engine air path dynamics, or on the frequency analysis of the lambda probe signal.

Advanced SI engines for passenger cars often use the cylinder deactivation technology for dethrottling and thus achieving a reduction of fuel consumption. The gas exchange valves of the deactivated cylinders are closed permanently by a zero lift of the cams. The solutions for cylinder deactivation can vary in the kind of gas composition included in the deactivated cylinders: charge air, exhaust gas or vacuum. All these strategies have in common the frequent loss of captured charge mass from cycle to cycle. Their two-stroke compression-expansion cycle additionally intensifies this phenomenon. Thus, a significant decrease of the minimum cylinder pressure can cause an undesired entry of lubricant into the combustion chamber. The idea was to ventilate the generally deactivated cylinders frequently to compensate the loss of captured cylinder charge mass. The task was to keep the minimum cylinder pressure above a certain limit to prevent the piston rings from a failure.

The startability of SI engines, especially of DISI engines, is the greatest challenge when using ethanol blended fuels. The development of a suitable injection strategy is therefore the main engineering target when developing an ethanol engine with direct injection. In order to limit the test efforts of such a program, a vaporization model has been created that provides the quantity of vaporized fuel depending on pressure and on start and end, respectively number and split relation of injections. This model takes account of the most relevant fuel properties such as density, surface tension and viscosity. It also considers the interaction of the spray with cylinder liner, cylinder head and piston. A comparison with test results shows the current status and the need for action of this simulation model.

The mixture composition heavily influences the combustion process of Port Fuel Injection (PFI) engines. The local mixture air-index at the spark plug is closely related to combustion instabilities and the cycle-by-cycle Indicated Mean Effective Pressure (IMEP) Coefficient of Variation (CoV) well correlates with the variability of the flame kernel development. The needs of reducing the engine emissions and consumption push the engine manufactures to implement techniques providing a better control of the mixture quality in terms of homogeneity and variability. Simulating the mixture formation of a PFI engine by means of CFD techniques is a critical issue, since involved phenomena are highly heterogeneous and a two phase flow must be considered. The aim of the paper is to present a multi-cycle methodology for the simulation of the injection and the mixture formation processes of high performance PFI engine, based on the validation of all the main physical sub-models involved.

The Common-rail injection system has allowed achieving a more flexible fuel injection control in DI-diesel engines by permitting a free mapping of the start of injection, injection pressure, rate of injection. All these benefits have been gained by installing this device in combustion chambers born to work with the conventional distributor and in-line-pump injection systems. Their design was aimed to improve air-fuel mixing and therefore they were characterized by the adoption of high-swirl ports and re-entrant bowls. Experiments have shown that the high injection velocities induced by common rail systems determine an enhancement of the air fuel mixing. By contrast, they cause a strong wall impingement too. The present paper aims to exploit a new configuration of the combustion chamber more suited to CR injection systems and characterized by low-swirl ports and larger bowl diameter in order to reduce the wall impingement.

The overall performance of direct injection (DI) engines is strictly correlated to the fuel liquid spray evolution into the cylinder volume. More in detail, spray behavior can drastically affect mixture formation, combustion efficiency, cycle to cycle engine variability, soot amount, and lubricant contamination. For this reason, in DI engine an accurate numerical reproduction of the spray behavior is mandatory. In order to improve the spray simulation accuracy, authors defined a new atomization model based on experimental evidences about ligament and droplet formations from a turbulent liquid jet surface. The proposed atomization approach was based on the assumption that the droplet stripping in a turbulent liquid jet is mainly linked to ligament formations. Reynolds-averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) simulation method was adopted for the continuum phase while the liquid discrete phase is managed by Lagrangian approach.