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As the invalidation of the oxygen sensor in the initial cycles at cold start, the engine can not operate based on the closed loop control based on oxygen sensor. And it may result in the misfire events and higher hydrocarbon (HC) emissions during this period. To solve this problem, a novel closed loop control based on ionization current in combustion cycle is proposed. The in-cylinder combustion quality is monitored by means of the ion current detection technique; meanwhile, if the misfire event is detected in the combustion cycle, the spark re-ignition is made in the current combustion cycle. In addition, to optimize the combustion and reduce HC emissions during cold start, the fuel injection quantity and ignition timing in the next cycle are adjusted based on the current ion current signal.

The effectiveness of after-treatment systems depends on the exhaust gas temperature, which is low during cold-start. As a result, Euro III, Euro IV and FTP75 require that the emissions tests include exhaust from the beginning of cold start. It is proved that 50%∼80% of HC and CO emissions are emitted during the cold start and the amount of unburned fuel from the crevices during starting is much higher than that under warmed engine conditions. The piston crevices is the most part of combustion chamber crevices, and results of mathematical simulations show that the piston crevice contribution to HC emissions is expected to increase during cold engine operation. Based on the transient HC test data and the double zone combustion model, this paper presents the study of the crevice HC Mechanism of the first firing cycle at cold start on an LPG SI Engine. A fast-response flame ionization detector (FFID) was employed to measure transient HC emissions of the first firing cycle.

This paper presents a study of LPG lean burn in a motorcycle SI engine. The lean burn limits are compared by several ways. The relations of lean burn limit with the parameters, such as engine speed, compression ratio and advanced spark ignition etc. are tested. The experimental results show that larger throttle opening, lower engine speed, earlier spark ignition timing, larger electrode gap and higher compression ratio will extend the lean burn limit of LPG. The emission of a LPG engine, especially on NOx emission, can be significantly reduced by means of the lean burn technology.

Gasoline Direct Injection (GDI) engines have attracted interest as automotive power-plants because of their potential advantages in down-sizing, fuel efficiency and in emissions reduction. However, GDI engines suffer from elevated unburned hydrocarbon (HC) emissions during start up process, which are sometimes worsened by misfires and partial burns. Moreover, as the engine is cranked to idle speed quickly in HEVs (Hybrid Electric Vehicle), the transients of quick starts are more dramatically than that in traditional vehicle, which challenge the optimization of combustion and emissions. In this study, test bench had been set up to investigate the GDI engine performances for ISG (Integrated Starter and Generator) HEVs during start up process. Based on the test system, cycle-controlled of the fuel injection mass, fuel injection timing and ignition timing can be obtained, as well as the cycle-resolved measurement of the HC concentrations and NO emissions.

This work presents the study of the methane jet flame in a pressurized vitiated co-flow burner (PVCB). The lift-off length and the stabilization of the methane jet flame under different environment pressures, co-flow temperatures, co-flow rates and jet velocities have been studied, and a chemical numerical simulation based on Gri-mech 3.0 was analyzed as well. The results could provide theoretical supports for the research of natural gas engine combustion stabilization control to increase its thermal efficiency. The experimental results show that the lift-off length decreases obviously (104.22mm to76.14mm) with the increase of the environment pressure (1to1.5bar, 1073K) and temperature (119.34mm to 43.74mm from 1058K to 1118K, 1bar), meanwhile, it also increases with the increment of the co-flow rate and jet velocity.

Spray behavior is regarded as one of main factors which influence engine performance, fuel consumption and emissions for diesel engine. In practice, spray characteristics from each orifice from a multi-hole nozzle are normally arranged symmetrically, while the hole-to-hole spray variation is unavoidable. This variation will cause spatial uneven distribution of spray and combustion degrade, which will be no longer inconsiderable in face of the more and more stringent emission rules. In this paper, two methods including spray macro-characteristics experiment and separated fuel mass measurement are employed to test the hole-to-hole spray variation of two six-hole symmetric VCO injectors of different brands, and experiments are operated under different conditions including different injection pressures, back pressures and injection durations.

Combustion diagnostics of highly diluted mixtures are essential for the estimation of the combustion quality, and control of combustion timing in advanced combustion systems. In this paper, a novel fast response flame detection technique based on active plasma is introduced and investigated. Different from the conventional ion current sensing used in internal combustion engines, a separate electrode gap is used in the detecting probing. Further, the detecting voltage across the electrode gap is modulated actively using a multi-coil system to be slightly below the breakdown threshold before flame arrival. Once the flame front arrives at the probe, the ions on the flame front tend to decrease the breakdown voltage threshold and trigger a breakdown event. Simultaneous electrical and optical measurements are employed to investigate the flame detecting efficacy via active plasma probing under both quiescent and flow conditions.

It has been revealed by researches that lubricant properties have a great effect on the low-speed pre-ignition (LSPI) frequency in downsizing turbocharged direct-injection engines which are developed for better fuel economy. Droplets of lubricant or lubricant-gasoline mixture are considered to be the potential pre-ignition sources. Those droplets fly into the combustion chamber and ignite the gasoline-air mixture. To study lubricant droplets fundamentally, a novel set of droplet auto-ignition system is designed based on a Dibble Burner for this experiment. Influences of metallic additive contents, viscosities, lubricant diluted with gasoline and waste lubricant on the ignition delay of droplets are investigated by testing 12 groups of lubricants or lubricant-gasoline mixture. The equivalent diameter of each droplet generated by micro-syringes is around 2.1 mm. The co-flow temperature varies from 1123 K to 1223 K, and the experiments are carried out at atmospheric pressure.

Spark ignition systems with the capability of providing spark event with either higher current level or longer discharge duration has been developed in recent years to help IC engines towards clean combustion with higher efficiency under lean/diluted intake charge. In this research, a boosted current spark strategy was proposed to investigate the effect of spark discharge current level and discharge duration on the combustion process. Firstly, the discharge characteristics of a boosted current spark system were tested with a traditional spark plug under crossflow conditions, and results showed that the spark channel was more stable, and was stretched much longer when the discharge current was boosted. Then the boosted current strategy was used in a spark ignition engine operating under lean conditions. Boosted current was added to the spark channel with different timing, duration, and current levels.

Due to the advantages of low weight, low emissions and good fuel economy, downsized turbocharged gasoline direct injection (GDI) engines are widely-applied nowadays. However, Low-Speed Pre-Ignition (LSPI) phenomenon observed in these engines restricts their improvement of performance. Some researchers have shown that auto-ignition of lubricant in the combustion chamber has a great effect on the LSPI frequency. To study the auto-ignition characteristics of lubricant, an innovative single droplet auto-ignition test system for lubricant and its mixture is designed and developed, with better accuracy and effectiveness. The experiments are carried out by hanging lubricant droplets on the thermocouple node under active thermo-atmosphere provided by a small “Dibble burner”. The auto-ignition process of lubricant droplets is recorded by a high-speed camera.

Combustion and emission characteristics of diesel and biodiesel blends (soybean methyl ester) were studied in a single-cylinder Direct Injection (DI) engine at different loads and a constant speed. The results show that NOx emission and fuel consumption are increased with increasing biodiesel percentage. Reduction of smoke opacity is significant at higher loads with a higher biodiesel ratio. Compared with the baseline diesel fuel, B20 (20% biodiesel) has a slight increase of NOx emission and similar fuel consumption. Smoke emission of B20 is close to that of diesel fuel. Results of combustion analysis indicate that start of combustion (SOC) for biodiesel blends is earlier than that for diesel. Higher biodiesel percentage results in earlier SOC. Earlier SOC for biodiesel blends is due to advanced injection timing from higher density and bulk modulus and lower ignition delay from higher cetane number.

Fuel films of several typical fuels were investigated by means of thermal gravity analysis (TGA). To make diesel homogeneous charge by means of film evaporation, it was concluded that to get 30%∼50% evaporation of film, the wall temperature should be set between 150°C and 180°C for diesel and 40°C∼60°C for gasoline, and to get 95% evaporation of film, the wall temperature should be set between 200°C and 250°C for diesel and 50°C∼100°C for gasoline, when the thickness of the fuel film is about 40 μ m. Based on the properties of fuels, the evaporation characteristics of diesel under 100°C should be improved.

Downsizing gasoline direct injection engine with turbo boost technology is the main trend for gasoline engine. However, with engine downsizing and ever increasing of power output, a new abnormal phenomenon, known as pre-ignition or super knock, occurs in turbocharged engines. Pre-ignition will cause very high in-cylinder pressure and high oscillations. In some circumstances, one cycle of severe pre-ignition may damage the piston or spark plug, which has a severe influence on engine performance and service life. So pre-ignition has raised lots of attention in both industry and academic society. More and more studies reveal that the auto-ignition of lubricants is the potential source for pre-ignition. The auto-ignition characteristics of different lubricants are studied. This paper focuses on the ignition delay of different lubricants in Controllable Active Thermo-Atmosphere (CATA) combustion system.

In this paper, the characteristics of performance and emissions of diesel and biodiesel blends are studied in a four-cylinder DI engine employing common rail injection system. The results show that engine output power is further reduced and brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) increased with the increase of the blend concentration. B100 provides average reduction by 8.6% in power and increase by 11% in BSFC. With respect to the emissions, although NOx emissions were increased with increasing the blend concentration, the increase depends on the load. Filter smoke number is reduced with increasing the blend concentration. At the same time, NO, NO2 and other specific emissions are also investigated. In addition, difference of performance and emission between standard parameters of ECU and modified parameters of ECU is investigated for B10 and B20 based on same output power. The results show that NOx emission and FSN are still lower than baseline diesel.

This paper presents experimental studies of particulate emissions in a small SI engine fueled with LPG and gasoline fuels. A single cylinder, four-stroke, water-cooled, 125cc EFI engine with gasoline fuel is used as the baseline engine. Characteristics of the particulate emissions of the two fuels are compared. Test results show that: there are great quantities of particulate emissions for both fuels, but the total numbers of particulate emissions for the two fuels are generally in the same level. The distribution of the particulate sizes is in bimodal type for the gasoline, but for the LPG its first peak is not markedly in some conditions. The particulate sizes of the second peak for the two fuels appear at about the same size. At middle loads and 3000r/min, the particulate emissions for both of the two fuels are the greatest.

In this paper, characteristics of gas emission and particle size distribution are investigated in a common rail diesel engine fueled with biodiesel blends. Gas emission and particle size distribution are measured by AVL FTIR - SESAM and SMPS respectively. The results show that although biodiesel blends would result in higher NOx emissions, characteristics of NOx emissions were also dependent on the engine load for waste cooking oil methyl ester. Higher blend concentration results in higher NO2 emission after two diesel oxidation catalyst s (DOC). A higher blend concentration leads to lower CO and SO2 emissions. No significant difference of Alkene emission is found among biodiesel blends. The particle size distributions of diesel exhaust aerosol consist of a nucleation mode (NM) with a peak below 50N• m and an accumulation mode with a peak above 50N • m. B100 will result in lower particulates with the absence of NM.

The First Firing Cycle (FFC) is very important at cold-start. Misfiring of the first firing cycle can lead to significant HC emissions and affect the subsequent cycles. This paper presents an investigation of characteristics of transient NO emissions in a small LPG SI engine with electronic gaseous injection system. To determine the optimal excess air coefficient ( λ=[A/F]/[A/F]stoic) of the first firing cycle, the emission of instantaneous NO was proposed as a useful criterion to judge if the combustion is occurred or not. A fast response NO detector- Cambustion fNOx400, based on the chemiluminescence's (CLD) method, has been employed to measure continuous, transient emissions of NO during the first firing cycle in the exhaust port of the engine. At the same time, the transient cylinder pressure, instantaneous crankshaft speed of the engine and engine-out HC emissions were measured and recorded.

Gasoline direct injection (GDI) technology is admitted to be one of the most effective measures to improve the fuel economy for the spark ignition (SI) engines. Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) combustion has advantages of low fuel consumption and ultra low NOx emissions. But the difficulty in the autoignition control and the narrow operation region inhibit the practical application of this technology. A hybrid combustion mode which combines SI mode and HCCI mode in separated working regions was regarded as a promising technology for HCCI engines. In addition, monitoring and providing feedback to the in-cylinder combustion characteristics is generally considered to be an effective method to improve and to optimize the combustion process. A lot of combustion information is included in the ion current generated by the in-cylinder combustion, and hence the ion current detection technique is considered to be a potential combustion feedback method.

The CO2 reduction request for automotive industry promotes the efforts on the engine thermal efficiency improvement. The goal of this research is to improve the thermal efficiency on an extremely downsized 3-cylinder 1.0 L turbocharged gasoline direct injection engine. Effects of compression ratio, exhaust gas recirculation (EGR), valve timing and viscosity of oil on fuel economy were studied. The results show that increasing compression ratio, from 9.6 to 12, can improve fuel economy at relative low load (below 12 bar BMEP), but has a negative effect at high load due to increased knock intensity. EGR can significantly reduce the pumping loss at low load, optimize combustion phase and reduce exhaust gas temperature. Therefore, the fuel consumption is reduced at all test points. The average brake thermal efficiency (BTE) benefit percentage is 3.47% with 9.6 compression ratio and 5.33 % with 12 compression ratio.

This paper presents an experimental study of the emission characteristics of a small Spark-Ignited, LPG engine. A single cylinder, four-stroke, water-cooled, 125cc SI engine for motorcycle is modified for using LPG fuel. The power output of LPG is above 95% power output of gasoline. The emission characteristics of LPG are compared with the gasoline. The test result shows that LPG for small SI engine will help to reduce the emission level of motorcycles. The HC and CO emission level can be reduced greatly, but NOx emissions are increased. The emission of motorcycle using LPG shows the potential to meet the more strict regulation.