The influence of mixing ratio of low carbon mixed alcohols on knock combustion of spark ignition engines

Abstract

Alcohol fuels, owing to the characteristics of oxygen-containing and high octane number, are considered as one potential alternative fuel additive in spark ignition (SI) engines. In this paper, the ethanol and n-butanol are blended with gasoline to form the new low-carbon mixed alcohols-gasoline blended fuels. The effect of different mixing proportions of ethanol and n-butanol in gasoline on knock combustion and fuel economy of SI engine was studied by experiment and simulation. The results showed that with the increase of n-butanol ratio, brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) increase, but knock index (KI) and knock intensity decrease. Moreover, crank angle delays under the same knocking condition when the engine fueled with E5-Bx and B5-Ey fuel, and the crank angle is delayed more significantly with the increase of engine speed. In addition, when the ethanol and n-butanol are blended as the same proportion in gasoline (i.e. x = y), the KI and knock intensity of E5-Bx fuel is lower than that of B5-Ey, which indicates that the B5-Ey fuel has better antiknock property. But the BSFC of B5-Ey is slightly greater than that of E5-Bx under the same operating condition, that is, the B5-Ey fuel has higher fuel consumption.