Abstract

The fuel economy and exhaust emissions of diesel engines can be improved by adding carbon nanotubes to petroleum diesel fuel. Carbon nanotubes, used as a promising nanoscale additive for diesel fuel, have high thermal conductivity and a large surface area to volume ratio. The thermophysical properties of these fuels, which depend on the composition of the mixtures, are analyzed in this study. Findings of research show that carbon nanotubes added to diesel fuel have little effect on its dynamic viscosity and thermal conductivity. By means of numerical models, we simulated the process of atomization and evaporation of diesel fuel with the different carbon nanotubes content in a constant volume combustion chamber. The accuracy of the calculations is confirmed by the good agreement between the calculated and experimental data. Simulation of mixture atomization showed that the jet length linearly depends on the carbon nanotubes content in diesel fuel. The more carbon nanotubes are in the mixture, the smaller the droplet Sauter mean diameter and the angle of the jet cone opening are. The presence of carbon nanotubes in diesel fuel insignificantly affects the fuel vapor content in it.

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