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Abstract
Fuel properties play a dominant role in the spray, mixture formation and combustion process, and are a key to emission control
and efficiency optimization. This paper deals with the influence of the fuel properties on the spray and combustion characteristics in
a high-pressure and temperature chamber. Light diesel fuel spray and combustion images were taken by using a high-speed video
camera and analyzed by their penetration and evaporation characteristics in comparison with current diesel fuel. Then, a single-
cylinder DI engine was used to investigate combustion and exhaust characteristics. The mixture formation of the light diesel fuel is
faster than that of the current fuel depending on physical properties like boiling point, density, viscosity and surface tension. Engine
test results show that smoke is reduced without an increase in other emissions.
r 2002 Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan, Inc. and Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
0389-4304/02/$ 22.00 r 2002 Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan, Inc. and Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 3 8 9 - 4 3 0 4 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 2 2 1 - 7 JSAE20024660
408 S.-w. Lee et al. / JSAE Review 23 (2002) 407–414
Table 1
combustion phenomena and perform optical measure- Experimental conditions
ments simultaneously. Around the constant volume Type of engine Direct injection single cylinder
chamber, the intake and exhaust valve, fuel injection toroidal 4 valve per cylinder
nozzle, piezo-type transducer for measuring the com- Bore stroke 135 150
Compression ratio 17.0
bustion pressure in the chamber, a prism to reflect the Injection equipment Common rail (6 hole)
laser sheet, a fan to stir the mixture and a spark plug go Swirl ratio 2.689 (normal)/0.750 (low)
ignite the mixture were installed. In the injection system,
an electronically controlled accumulator-type fuel injec-
tion system was used to realize the high-pressure Table 2
injection for the determined injection quantity and Fuel properties
timing. For controlling the injection timing and amount, Fuel property Base diesel Light diesel
a pulse generator was used for arbitrary setting of these. 3
Fuel density (at 151C), kg/m 835.5 795.9
Copper laser was used as a light source, as shown in Boiling temperature, K 169.5 151.0
Fig. 2. Laser sheets were introduced, using two cylin- Viscosity (at 301C), mm2/s 3.729 1.465
drical lenses and a prism. The laser sheet was Surface tension, mN/m 28.5 —
synchronized with a high-speed video photography Cetane value 53.0 52.5
Lower heating value, MJ/kg 45.8 46.2
camera (made by Photoron Co.) which is capable of
taking 9000 frames of images per second to observe
cross-sectional spray and combustion. and performance characteristics of light diesel fuel. The
Copper vapor laser was synchronized with pulse specifications are shown in Table 1.
signals from the video camera. Signals from a computer
were output and sent to the injector and the spark plug.
Pressure data in the chamber were counted with the 2.2. Test fuels
computer through an A/D board.
Also, a single cylinder engine that was attached to a Distillation characteristics of the fuels are shown in
common rail system was used to investigate the exhaust Table 2 and Fig. 3. Light diesel (Nisseki Mitsubishi Co.)
S.-w. Lee et al. / JSAE Review 23 (2002) 407–414 409
Fig. 3. Distillation characteristic of each fuel. Fig. 5. Temperature history of ethylene combustion.
Table 3
Experimental conditions
Items Conditions
2.3. The experiment method conditions and injection timing are shown in Table 3. In
an engine test, the experimental conditions (injection
To reproduce the high-pressure and temperature pressure and amount) are shown in Table 4. Combus-
conditions of a diesel engine, a mixture of ethylene, tion characteristics based on exhaust measurement and
oxygen and nitrogen is created by the fan and ignited by indicated pressure diagram were analyzed under the
the spark plug. Concentration of each gas was adjusted conditions of 1500 rpm fixed and 40 and 60 MPa
by measuring the partial pressure of each gas, using a injection pressure.
pressure gauge attached to the chamber.
For spray visualization without combustion, oxygen 2.4. Numerical analysis
concentration was adjusted to 3% after ethylene
combustion. Oxygen concentration was adjusted to The behaviors of sprays were predicted by using the
21% after ethylene combustion to observe spray KIVA-3 code that has been widely used as one of the
combustion. Gas temperatures in the chamber were most useful computational simulation codes for in-
calculated as a function of time based on the measured cylinder fluid dynamics accompanied by combustion [2].
pressure histories as shown in Figs. 4 and 5. The wave length model was adopted to analyze and
Thus, specific fuel injection timing was selected for a predict the breakup process of the spray with the diesel
given combination of pressure and temperature, after engine cylinder [3]. The calculation parameters were
the ignition of the ethylene mixture. The experimental density, surface tension vapor pressure and viscosity.
410 S.-w. Lee et al. / JSAE Review 23 (2002) 407–414
Table 5
Calculation conditions
Properties Value
Fig. 7. Viscosity curve. Figs. 9 and 10 show the spray images of each fuel
under the condition of 1.8 MPa and 800 K. In these
results, spray of light diesel was clearly short and thin in
comparison with current diesel. This is because the
Values of density and surface tension were used as penetration becomes weak due to the low density. In
730% value of current diesel fuel as shown in Table 5. addition, evaporation becomes active because the low
Also, the vapor pressure and viscosity values as shown surface tension and the viscosity of light diesel promotes
in Figs. 6 and 7 [4] were used. atomization.
The calculation conditions are indicated in Table 5 Images under the same ambient condition and
and the spray angle was measured from the image and injection pressure of 80 MPa are shown in Fig. 10. The
used as a mean value of 121 for the calculation. A half liquid penetration distance tends to become somewhat
cylinder coordinate had a 140 mm diameter and 60 mm longer with the increased injection pressure at the nozzle
S.-w. Lee et al. / JSAE Review 23 (2002) 407–414 411
Fig. 10. Images of each diesel fuel (Pi : 80 MPa, Wf : 28.4 mg, Pa :
1.8 MPa, Ta : 800 K).
Fig. 13. Combustion images of each fuel (Pi : 80 MPa, Wf : 28.4 mg, Pa :
1.8 MPa, Ta : 800 K).
gas phase became narrow as density increased. Penetra- (2) Influence of surface tension: The result predicting
tion increases as density become high, because air the influence of surface tension is shown in Fig. 15.
resistance of the droplet under progress becomes From this figure, it can be seen that evaporation had a
proportionate to the square of diameter. Also, in the tendency to be restrained as surface tension became
case of low density of 0.59 kg/m3, it was found that the high. This was because atomization by the shear force
gas phase of fuel was distributed widely around the with the air was restrained and the Sauter mean
injector tip because of the lack of relative momentum. diameter increased. The reason, however, that there
S.-w. Lee et al. / JSAE Review 23 (2002) 407–414 413
(1) The spray of the light diesel fuel with low boiling
point and low density because short and narrow because
atomization and evaporation were promoted compared
to the current diesel.
(2) In case of the light diesel, the luminosity of the
flame was weaker than that of the current diesel because
combustion was improved by the promotion of eva-
poration and introduction of the air. Therefore a
reduction of smoke can be expected.
(3) The performance obtained in the experimental of
the light diesel was almost equivalent to that of the
current diesel without deterioration of other exhaust
gases, while smoke was reduced substantially.
Also, spray characteristics were simulated using
KIVA-3 code and the following results were obtained.
(4) With lower values of density, surface tension and
viscosity of the fuel, the effects were that more
atomization and mixture formation were promoted.
(5) Because atomization and evaporation were
affected largely by the vapor pressure of fuel, there
was a need to control the vapor pressure characteristics
in the formation of an appropriate mixture.
Acknowledgements