Structural Comparison of Naturally Aspirated and Turbocharged Diesel Engine for Steel and Aluminium Made Radiator: A Finite Element Study

Abstract

The current study is based on the structural analysis of radiators made of different materials to compare their effectiveness in the case of naturally aspirated and turbocharged diesel engines. For the analysis of the radiator structure, ABAQUS software was used. In the ABAQUS, static structural analysis was made to calculate the strength of the radiator. The said software is capable of calculating the strength of the radiator considering the boundary conditions (i.e., fixing at corners) as well as the loading conditions. It was observed that stresses generated while using an aluminium radiator were very high than those produced by steel radiators. According to the study, the following are the key findings for the steel and aluminium radiators. In the first case, while three corners were fixed, the steel radiator showed a deflection of 1.86 mm while aluminium exhibited 5.65 mm. However, in the second case in which the radiator had four fixed corners, the deflection of the steel radiator was 1.10 mm, while that of aluminium was 3.36 mm. Additionally, based on the deflections obtained from all investigations, it was found that radiators made of aluminium were more sensitive than those made of steel in both naturally aspirated and turbocharged applications. However, due to aluminium’s strong thermal conductivity, it is compatible with naturally aspirated engines in terms of thermal capacity. To combat turbocharged engine complications caused by high temperatures, such as thermal cracking, engine wear and tear, and so on, a steel-made radiator is more suitable than an aluminium radiator, hence mitigating the issues.