Chapter Nine - Performance enhancement approaches for Mahua biodiesel blend on diesel Engine

Abstract

Owing to degradation of petroleum-based fuels from time to time, there is a need to develop substitute fuels. One of the alternatives is usage of biofuels in place of existing fossil fuels due to their desirable properties which will meet the requirement of Automobiles. The present report is focused on Mahua Biodiesel, which is derived from nonedible source of Mahua oil. Because of high viscosity, poor atomization of fuel, deposition of carbon, etc., it is not feasible to utilize straight vegetable oils. In order to overcome these limitations, biodiesels are produced using transesterification. To have compatibility with existing diesel Engines, these transesterified oils are used at optimal blend. This chapter is aimed to present a case study on modifying the design parameter of varying combustion chamber geometry and fuel additives such as oxygenated additive and metal-based additive, improving the performance of the Engine. Further, the results on two combustion chamber geometries, viz., hemispherical and toroidal geometries, are discussed. The variation of Performance, Combustion, and Emission trends with oxygenated additive of ethanol and metal-based additive of alumina is presented.