A comparative analysis of the engine performance, exhaust emissions and combustion behaviors of a compression ignition engine fuelled with biodiesel/diesel/1-butanol (C4 alcohol) and biodiesel/diesel/n-pentanol (C5 alcohol) fuel blends

Performance, combustion, and emission characteristics of a CI engine fueled with emulsified diesel-biodiesel blends at different water contents

The properties of different blends of palm kernel oil (PKO) biodiesel obtained from base catalyzed transesterification with diesel fuel were measured based on the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) standards. The performance and emission analysis of diesel, PKO biodiesel and its blends with diesel were also carried out using a 2-cylinder in-line, water cooled naturally aspirated RD270 Ruggerini diesel engine at constant load. Diesel fuel produced maximum power and maximum torque of 18.16 kW and 64.30 NM at 3200 rpm and 2400 rpm, respectively. Similarly, the blend B20 gave a maximum power of 18.44 kW at 3600 rpm and maximum torque of 63.90 NM at 2400 rpm. However, the maximum power and torque of other blends were slightly lower than that of diesel. Also the concentration of CO and HC emissions for pure biodiesel (B100) and its blends were significantly lower than that of diesel. The cetane number, calorific value, kinematic viscosity at 40°C and pour point of the PKO biodiesel is 52.3, 32.50...

Effects of blend on the properties, performance and emission of palm kernel oil biodiesel.

The full load performance characteristics of a diesel engine fuelled with palm kernel biodiesel and its blend with diesel fuel are presented in this paper. The biodiesel was synthesised from Nigerian palm kernel oil through a direct base catalysed transesterification process using sodium hydroxide and methanol as the catalyst and alcohol, respectively. The produced biodiesel was blended with neat diesel fuel at a ratio of 20% biodiesel to 80% diesel by volume. The engine torque, brake power, brake specific fuel consumption and brake mean effective pressure were determined for each of the fuels at 400 rpm intervals between 1200 and 3600 rpm. In other to establish a baseline for comparison, the engine was first run on neat diesel. The test results interestingly revealed that the fuel blend (B20) produced higher torque at low and medium engine speeds than neat diesel fuel and unblended biodiesel (B100). This suggests that it can be a suitable fuel for heavy duty engines that are required to develop high torq...

Performance characteristics of palm kernel biodiesel and its blend in a CI engine

Bioethanol fuel was synthesised from various Nigerian crops (palm (Elaeis Guineensis) wine, raffia (Raphia vinifera) trunk and sugar cane (Saccharum L.)) to serve as alternative fuels for internal combustion engines. Bioethanol was obtained through fermentation and distillation from these selected Nigerian crops and was then purified. Physical properties of the bioethanol and various petrol–bioethanol blends such as vapour pressure, octane number, flash point, heating values, auto ignition temperature and density were evaluated using the American Society for Testing and Materials methods. The calorific value of petrol decreased from 44.40 to 44.22 MJ/kg with a blend of 10% of alcohol (E10). The calorific value of the produced ethanol (E100) is 29.78 MJ/kg. The research octane number (RON) of petrol increased from 91 to 94 with a blend of 10% of alcohol (E10). The RON of the produced ethanol (E100) is 114. The flash point increased from -40°C at E10 to 12.6°C at E100. The results showed that the addition o...

Effects of blends on the physical properties of bioethanol produced from selected Nigerian crops

This study deals with artificial neural network (ANN) modeling of a diesel engine to predict the exhaust emissions of the engine. To acquire data for training and testing the proposed ANN, a single cylinder, four-stroke test engine was fuelled with biodiesel blended with diesel and operated at different loads. Using some of the experimental data for training, an ANN model based on feed forward neural network for the engine was developed. Then, the performance of the ANN predictions were measured by comparing the predictions with the experimental results which were not used in the training process. It was observed that the ANN model can predict the engine exhaust emissions quite well with correlation coefficients, with very low root mean square errors. This study shows that, as an alternative to classical modeling techniques, the ANN approach can be used to accurately predict the performance and emissions of internal combustion engines.

M. Muralidhara

Papers

Performance and Exhaust Emissions Analysis of a Diesel Engine Using Methyl Esters of Fish Oil with Artificial Neural Network Aid