Investigation on passenger car CRDI engine for optimization of its fuel and operating parameters for lower emissions fuelled with diesel, biodiesel and higher alcohol blends

Abstract

In the present examination it was attempted to analyse the influence of jatropha methyl ester along with butanol and operating parameters of a three-cylinder automotive passenger car common rail direct injection (CRDI) engine on its performance and emission features. Design of experiments methodology was adopted to design the experiments for the present work. NOx, smoke and brake thermal efficiency were the responses and torque, speed, percentage biodiesel in the diesel/biodiesel blend and percentage of higher alcohol blend were the factors for the work. Percentage influence of each factor on the responses and the optimum combination levels of factors was obtained through Taguchi parametric design. From the analysis it was observed that among the torque and speed, the influence of torque is more in the performance and emission features of the tested engine. Also, addition of butanol influences the engine characteristics when compared with that of biodiesel. Among the operating and fuel parameters tested, operating parameters of the engine show their dominant role in lowering the NOx and smoke emission with better BTE with a percentage contribution of 76 when compared to the fuel parameters contribution of 24%