Comparison of local gasoline fuel characteristics and SI engine performance with commercial fuel additives

Abstract

Fossil fuel is the main source for powering internal combustion engine in the existing design. Though different sources of renewable and alternative fuels were suggested, gasoline fuel still the dominant source for operating SI engine. In this study, a comparison has been conducted to evaluate the fuel properties and engine performance with commercial additives. Has been studied locally available types of gasoline fuel, which include local gasoline M0, local enhanced gasoline M2, commercial enhanced gasoline M3, in addition to using a type of commercial fuel optimizer with local gasoline M1, the addition ratio (1 / 120) by volume. It was adopted local gasoline M0 as a reference for comparison. Performance tests are conducted by using different fuel (M0, M1, M2, M3) in a single-cylinder SI engine under the wide-open throttle (WOT) condition at a wide range of engine speeds (1200–2800 rpm). The results showed an increase octane number and viscosity of fuel by about (19.77% 11.538%) respectively and the reduction of the heating value of fuel by about 2.78% when using the commercial fuel optimizer. As well as increased brake torque and brake power at an average of 6.852% compared to fuel M0. Also, brake specific fuel consumption and brake thermal efficiency improved by an average of 4.07% and 7.27%, respectively. The best performance was with fuel M1 at which the brake torque and the brake thermal efficiency were at 2800 rpm higher than the M0 fuel by 18% and 10.9% respectively.