Ring Pack Research Articles

Thermal and static analysis of engine piston rings

The piston is the most important component of internal combustion engines. The piston ring contains a ring pack and cylinder wall. The piston ring is the moving component and it is composed of aluminium matrix composites. The aim of the work is to determine the structural and thermal stress distribution of piston rings using CATIA and ANSYS. Combustion engine pistons transform heat energy into mechanical energy by expanding gases. The thermal and structural analyses were done on the piston rings model using the properties of aluminium matrix composites (aluminium A2024 alloy and fly ash).

Modeling and prediction of the running-in behavior of the piston ring pack system based on the stochastic surface roughness

This paper proposes an efficient numerical approach to predict the initial running-in process of piston ring pack/cylinder liner system. A combined mixed lubrication and wear model coupled with an oil transport model was developed. In order to predict the hydrodynamic pressure efficiently, two improved methodologies, including the Fischer-Burmsister-Newton-Schur (FBNS) approach and the Grid Refinement (GR) strategy, were adopted. Meanwhile, in order to take into account the effect of skewness, Weibull distribution function was adopted to characterize the asperity height distribution. Predicting the wear of cylinder liner was based on the Archard's wear law. The influences of asperity plastic deformation and wear on asperity height distribution were considered. The results show that the developed model can well predict the initial running-in behavior of piston ring pack/cylinder liner system under an engine-like condition.

Investigation of hydrodynamic behavior in random packing using CFD simulation

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations of countercurrent gas–liquid flow in random packings of Raschig rings were carried out in this study. This model used gravity simulation to construct the random packing structure, and a volume expansion-recovery method to improve the meshing quality. A simple feedback control scheme was applied to control the gas inlet flow rate so that pressure drop can be estimated. The generated characteristics of the packing structure such as the number of packing elements, dry surface area and porosity were found to be close to experiments. CFD predictions of hydrodynamics properties are also validated by the experimental data using a small column section. The results indicate that our CFD model was able to capture the essential hydrodynamics behavior of the gas–liquid countercurrent flow. Hence, the approach presented in this study can be used as a basis for studying the effect of detailed packing-geometry design on hydrodynamic and mass transfer characteristics.

Packing Rearrangements in 4-Hydroxycyanobenzene Under Pressure

4-hydroxycyanobenzene (4HCB) is a dipolar molecule formed of an aromatic substituted benzene ring with the CN and OH functional groups at the 1 and 4 positions. In the crystalline state, it forms spiral chains via hydrogen bonding, which pack together through interactions. The direct stacking of benzene rings down the a- and b-axes and its interactions throughout the structure gives rise to its semiconductor properties. Here, high-pressure studies are conducted on 4HCB in order to investigate how the packing and intermolecular interactions, related to its semiconductor properties, are affected. High-pressure single-crystal X-ray diffraction was performed with helium and neon as the pressure-transmitting mediums up to 26 and 15 GPa, respectively. The pressure-dependent behaviour of 4HCB in He was dominated by the insertion of He into the structure after 2.4 GPa, giving rise to two phase transitions, and alterations in the interactions above 4 GPa. 4HCB compressed in Ne displayed two phase transitions associated with changes in the orientation of the 4HCB molecules, giving rise to twice as many face-to-face packing of the benzene rings down the b-axis, which could allow for greater charge mobility. In the He loading, the hydrogen bonding interactions steadily decrease without any large deviations, while in the Ne loading, the change in 4HCB orientation causes an increase in the hydrogen bonding interaction distance. Our study highlights how the molecular packing and interactions evolve with pressure as well as with He insertion.

Liquid flow behavior in a multiliquid-inlet rotating packed bed reactor with three-dimensional printed packing

The multiliquid-inlet rotating packed bed (MLI-RPB) reactor has been proved to have excellent gas-liquid mass-transfer performance. However, studies of liquid flow behavior, the fundamentals to understand the mass-transfer process, in packing rings of the MLI-RPB reactor are scarce. In this work, the designed packing rings were accurately manufactured via three-dimensional (3D) printing technology. The liquid flow behavior in different zones of the MLI-RPB reactor were comprehensively investigated via the high-speed photography method. Except for liquid droplet and liquid film, a new type of liquid bridge was observed in the packing rings. Quantitative analyses have been discussed, such as the average diameter of droplet out of packing rings ranging from 0.2 to 0.9 mm and the value of droplet size distribution width m ranging from 5 to 9. In addition, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation of liquid flow in the MLI-RPB reactor was conducted based on the no-simplified geometry model. Liquid velocity magnitude along radial direction in the MLI-RPB reactor and the liquid holdup in different packing rings was calculated. Combining three technologies of 3D printing, high-speed photography, and CFD simulation can provide an efficient pathway for packing design and hydrodynamics research of not only the MLI-RPB reactor, but also other RPB reactors with wire mesh packing.

Influence of contact area on the sliding friction and wear behaviour of an electrochemical jet textured Al-Si alloy

Environmental legislation continues to drive optimisation of internal combustion engines in the automotive sector in an effort to reduce harmful emissions and promote fuel efficiency. Significant frictional losses occur at the ring pack, prompting research on reducing sliding friction at the ring – liner interface through the use of surface texturing. This study assesses the influence of contact area on the friction and wear behaviour of light-weight monolithic hyper-eutectic Al-Si alloy with a textured surface generated by electrochemical jet texturing. Flat rectangular samples were prepared from a cast cylinder liner via electro-discharge machining and flat lapped to 6 µm diamond finish prior to immersion in a 1 mol solution of NaOH for 120 s to simulate the mechanical honing process. Surfaces were electrochemically jet textured using a 2.3 mol solution of NaCl and current density of 220 A/cm2. An offset array of 1.3 × 0.3 mm rectangular features at 1.2 mm spacing was created with an average depth of 39 µm. Lubricated reciprocating sliding was carried out at a stroke length of 25 mm in a bath of PAO (4 cSt) at 100 °C against a 6 mm diameter, 13 mm long 52100 steel cylinder with three different contact areas corresponding to initial contact pressures of 157, 12 and 4 MPa. Sliding frequencies were varied between 1 and 15 Hz at a load of 50 N in order to establish the influence of both the contact pressure and velocity on the friction behaviour as a function of the lubrication regime. Textured features were observed to reduce the average coefficient of friction by up to 37% via a lubricant reservoir mechanism if the counter-surface contact width was greater than the feature dimension. Increases in contact pressure prevented a micro-EHL effect due to adhesive wear rather than pressurization of textured features.

Gas escape to crankcase: impact of system parameters on sealing behavior of a piston cylinder ring pack

Internal combustion engines are the generators of energy for many transportation applications, but they still have an overall low efficiency due to mechanical and thermal losses. The combustion chamber is the core element of the engine and it ought to be perfectly sealed; however, some of the gas leaks toward the crankcase due to imperfect sealing of the rings. This leakage is known as blow-by and affects efficiency, correct lubrication and emissions. The aim of this paper was to understand, in a more detailed way, how some parameters could affect the sealing efficiency of a ring pack. In particular, ring gaps, ring masses and elastic properties, and ring static twists, were varied from the original and investigated for their influence on the inter-ring dynamics and sealing efficiency. The problem, referred to a turbo diesel engine, was formulated in terms of motion equations for the rings and gas equations for the inter-ring crevices, and solved in ©Ricardo RINGPAK solver. The results were compared with the original design and with the reference literature. These results confirm that ring gaps and ring unstable motion have an important role in the phenomenon of gas blow-by. In addition, the second ring emerged to have a more important role on the blow-by reduction with respect to the top ring. However, this phenomenon is complex due to the interaction of several parameters, not all of which were included in this study. Nevertheless, these findings can already be taken into account for further studies or experimental investigations.

Simulation of the cylinder bore distortion and effect on the sealing capacity of the ringpack

One of the several losses of a combustion chamber is the gas leakage toward the crankcase due to imperfect sealing of the rings, it is commonly known as blow-by and it affects efficiency and emissions. One important factor affecting it is the distorted cylinder bore. The paper describes the equations that rule the blow-by phenomenon in terms of ring and gas dynamics, subsequently, the bore distortion of the cylinder was obtained and its orders calculated through Fourier series. The ringpack capacity in the distorted bore cylinder was then analysed using ©Ricardo RINGPAK Solver. Order zero distortion resulted to be the most important order due to the highest amount of gas lost in the crankcase. Orders one and two didn’t showed significant differences from the non-distorted bore case, while orders three and four resulted in high blow-by values, even if their magnitude of distortion was lower in comparison to other orders. The ring pack behavior showed to be affected by bore distortion and its magnitude, however, the blow by phenomenon showed to depend also on other factors in a complex manner.

Boundary friction characterisation of a used cylinder liner subject to fired engine conditions and surface deposition

In cylinder friction contributes as a primary source of parasitic dissipations in IC engines. For future engines to become more efficient, with enhanced fuel economy and increased power output, accurate prediction of new designs is required over the full lifetime of an engine. The work carried out presents use of a local pressure coefficient of boundary shear strength of asperities value, taking into account the localised effects of surface texture, coating and surface deposition. XPS spectra analysis was also carried out to identify the surface depositions as a result of combustion, not previously taken into account during piston ring pack simulation. Friction was shown by simulation to drop by up to 30% between the compression and combustion stroke as a result of using a carriable coefficient of boundary shear strength of asperities. It was found that piston varnish on the liner corresponded to higher values of the pressure coefficient of boundary shear strength of asperities, therefore showing the importance of using real system components run under representative operating conditions or numerical analyses.

Detailed analysis of piston secondary motion and tribological performance

This article presents a detailed analytical model to evaluate piston skirt tribology under hydrodynamic lubrication. The contribution of the piston ring pack lubrication has been taken into account to study piston secondary motion and tribological performance. A system of nonlinear equations comprising Reynolds equation and force equilibrium is solved to calculate piston ring pack friction force and its moment about wrist pin axis. Instantaneous minimum oil film thickness at piston ring/liner interface has been estimated considering different boundary conditions: full Sommerfeld, oil separation, and Reynolds cavitation and reformation. The ring pack model has capability to be used for a wide range of ring face profiles under boundary and hydrodynamic lubrication. Piston secondary motion is evaluated using lubrication theory and equilibrium of forces and moments, to examine the effect of wrist pin location, piston skirt/liner clearance, and oil rheology. Numerical method and finite difference scheme have been used to define piston eccentricity and hydrodynamic pressure acting over the skirt.

Gas flow maldistribution in random packed beds of non-spherical particles – A CFD study

In this work, gas maldistribution in random packings of cylinders and Raschig rings is studied with particle-resolved direct numerical simulation (PRDNS) employing a finite volume solver for Cartesian grids and the immersed boundary method for the treatment of complex geometries. The geometry of the random packed bed has been obtained in a separate simulation based on a sequential deposition of particles in a cylindrical column and a simplified mechanics with additional radial force allowing for higher packing densities. The first part of the work focuses on comparison of the packings of cylinders and rings with respect to their ability to distribute the flow uniformly over the cross-section of the column when the gas in the form of a narrow jet enters along the column axis and impinges on the bed directly. The second part is devoted to analysis of three different inlet configurations and their influence on gas maldistribution in the packing of Raschig rings. It has been found that the random packing of rings has comparable properties of flow uniformisation to the same arrangement of full cylinders with significantly lower pressure drop and much less pronounced effect of formation of localised jets at the bed outlet. Among the considered inlet configurations the most beneficial is the one in which the gas duct is tangential to the walls of the distribution chamber.

Design and experimental development of a new electronically controlled cylinder lubrication system for the large two-stroke crosshead diesel engines

Accurate, stable and reliable lubrication for the cylinders is very important to ensure the trouble-free operation of the marine diesel engines. A new electronically controlled cylinder lubrication system has been developed to remedy the defects of the conventional mechanical lubrication system. This new system’s design method, composition and implementation are described. The sensitivity tests are conducted on the test bench and the verification tests are also fulfilled on operating vessels. The main performance data are as follows: oil injection pressure about 3.0 MPa, oil injection timing precision 0.1 ms, oil injection duration 15 °CA or less. The oil injection concentrates onto the piston rings pack to ensure the good lubrication and neutralization, and the oil injection frequency is regulated according to engine load, the sulphur content in fuel, total base number of cylinder oil, cylinder liner running-in condition and so on. This results in the cylinder oil consumption rate falling approximately 25% compared with that of the conventional mechanical lubrication system. As a retrofit on vessels in service, the lubrication system has been fitted more than 120 main engines and has a payback period of less than 2 years.

Cylinder liner deformation orders and efficiency of a piston ring-pack

One of the several losses of a combustion chamber is the gas leakage toward the crankcase due to imperfect sealing of the rings. It is commonly known as blow by and it affects efficiency and emissions. The paper initially describes a bibliographic review of the phenomenon, together with the equations of the system. A typical piston ring pack for internal combustion engine is proposed to be analysed and solved using ©Ricardo RINGPAK Solver. A specific issue such as Bore distortion orders were used to investigate the sealing capacity of the ring-pack in terms of ring dynamics, inter-ring pressures and mass flows. Bore distortion orders and their magnitude showed to affect the ring pack behavior. Order zero distortion resulted to be the most important order due to the highest amount of gas lost in the crankcase, while orders three and four resulted to generate high blow-by values, even if their magnitude of distortion is lower in comparison to other orders.

Predicting Leak Rate Through Valve Stem Packing in Nuclear Applications

Leaking valves have forced shutdown in many nuclear power plants. The myth of zero leakage or adequate sealing must give way to more realistic maximum leak rate criterion in design of nuclear bolted flange joints and valve packed stuffing boxes. It is well established that the predicting leakage in these pressure vessel components is a major engineering challenge to designers. This is particularly true in nuclear valves due to different working conditions and material variations. The prediction of the leak rate through packing rings is not a straightforward task to achieve. This work presents a study on the ability of microchannel flow models to predict leak rates through packing rings made of flexible graphite. A methodology based on experimental characterization of packing material porosity parameters is developed to predict leak rates at different compression stress levels. Three different models are compared to predict leakage; the diffusive and second-order flow models are derived from Naiver–Stokes equations and incorporate the boundary conditions of an intermediate flow regime to cover the wide range of leak rate levels and the lattice model is based on porous media of packing rings as packing bed (Dp). The flow porosity parameters (N, R) of the microchannels assumed to simulate the leak paths present in the packing are obtained experimentally. The predicted leak rates from different gases (He, N2, and Ar) are compared to those measured experimentally in which the set of packing rings is mainly subjected to different gland stresses and pressures.

Experimental Assessment of the Depth of the Deformed Layer in the Roller Burnishing Process

This paper presents the methods of experimental determining the depth of the plastically deformed top layer in the roller burnishing process. Precise determination of the depth of the plastically deformed layer is difficult due to slight deformation at the boundary of the plastic and elastic zone, the lack of visible changes in the microstructure, and minimal changes in microhardness. The article shows the method of original measurement method that consists in determining the thickness of the deformed layer using rings. The method involves the profilographometric measurements of the disconnected rings (samples) which are flat-faced in the package on the mandrel. The rings material deforms plastically in the surface layer causing wrapping of the end face of the ring in the direction of the rolling tool movement. After dismantling the ring pack, measurements were made on the face of each ring along radial directions, and the thickness of the deformed layer was observed on the microscope. The method was verified by microhardness measurements in the cross-section and cross-section of the ring. The results of deformation depth measurements were verified by finite-element-based numerical simulation.

Effects of Raschig Ring Packing Patterns on Pressure Drop, Heat Transfer, Methane Conversion, and Coke Deposition on a Semi-pilot-scale Packed Bed Reformer

The effects of Raschig ring packing patterns on the efficiency of dry methane reforming reactions were investigated using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The present study aims to understand the behavior of fluid flow in packed bed reactors, especially under low reactor-to-ring ratios between 4 and 8. Three packing patterns were studied: vertical staggered (VS), chessboard staggered (CS), and reciprocal staggered (RS). It was determined that packing pattern notably affected pressure drop across the reactor length. The VS pattern produced the lowest pressure drop of 223 mPa, while the CS and RS patterns produced pressure drops of 228 mPa and 308 mPa, respectively. The values of methane conversion can be increased by ca. 2 % by selecting a more suitable packing pattern (i.e., 76 % for the VS pattern and 74 % for the CS and RS patterns).

Combined lubricant–surface system approach for potential passenger car CO2 reduction on piston-ring-cylinder bore assembly

The impact of reducing friction losses on the fuel consumption and CO2 emissions was investigated through computational simulation of piston ring dynamics. Experimentally determined cylinder bore surface finishes, low viscosity oil and ring coatings response to oil additives were used as simulation inputs. Oil viscosity grades from SAE10W-40 to SAE0W-4 were considered. 3D roughness measurements of regular and “mirror-like” cylinder bores were used to estimate the flow factors coefficients for the average Reynolds equation and asperity contact stiffness. The combination of smooth cylinder bores, low viscosity oils with appropriate additives promoted ring pack FMEP reductions of up to 66% at part load and WOT with consequent CO2 reductions of up to 10% at part load and 1.5% at WOT.

Price-and-verify: a new algorithm for recursive circle packing using Dantzig–Wolfe decomposition

Packing rings into a minimum number of rectangles is an optimization problem which appears naturally in the logistics operations of the tube industry. It encompasses two major difficulties, namely the positioning of rings in rectangles and the recursive packing of rings into other rings. This problem is known as the Recursive Circle Packing Problem (RCPP). We present the first dedicated method for solving RCPP that provides strong dual bounds based on an exact Dantzig--Wolfe reformulation of a nonconvex mixed-integer nonlinear programming formulation. The key idea of this reformulation is to break symmetry on each recursion level by enumerating one-level packings, i.e., packings of circles into other circles, and by dynamically generating packings of circles into rectangles. We use column generation techniques to design a "price-and-verify" algorithm that solves this reformulation to global optimality. Extensive computational experiments on a large test set show that our method not only computes tight dual bounds, but often produces primal solutions better than those computed by heuristics from the literature.

A comparative study of different mass transfer and liquid hold-up correlations in modeling CO2 absorption with MEA

Although CO2 absorption processes have been widely studied in both laboratory and industrial scales, the viability of different relations for the estimation of mass transfer coefficients has not been studied for industrial units. In this paper, the accuracy of different various equations for the estimation of mass transfer coefficients were are evaluated and compared, on the basis of according to the results of an industrial CO2 absorption unit. Therefore, the relations proposed by Onda, Bravo and Billet-Schules were are selected. Also, in some parts of the column pall ring packing was is used. in these parts the Hanley mass transfer coefficients were also used. In addition, Hanley mass transfer coefficients are used for those parts of the column in which pall ring packing is used. Based on the results of rate-based modeling of the column, obtained results show that the Onda equations show have higher accuracy compared to the other mass transfer equations. The comparison was is carried out based on CO2 absorption capacity, temperature profile and rich solvent concentration. The average errors of Onda's mass transfer correlations and Billet & Schultes's liquid holdup correlations in estimating CO2 absorption (%), temperature of rich solvent's temperature, temperature of outlet water's temperature and loading of rich solvent's loading were are 1.153, 2.923, 6.99 and 1.163% respectively. Onda and Billet & Schultes correlations exhibited the most accurate results. Also additionally, liquid film discretization shows indicates that the reaction occurs almost rather instantaneously at liquid-vapor interface and diffusion is the controlling step in the absorption process.

Controllable Synthesis and Catalytic Performance of Gold Nanoparticles with Cucurbit[n]urils (n = 5⁻8).

A series of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) was prepared in situ with different cucurbit[n]urils (CB[n]s) in an alkaline aqueous solution. The nanoparticle sizes can be well controlled by CB[n]s (n = 5, 6, 7, 8) with different ring sizes. The packing densities of CB[5–8] and free surface area on AuNPs were determined. A direct relationship was found between the ring size and packing density of CB[n]s with respect to the AuNP-catalyzed reduction of 4-nitrophenol in the presence of NaBH4. The larger particle size and higher surface coverage of bigger CB[n]-capped AuNPs significantly decreased the catalytic activity. Furthermore, this work could lead to new applications that utilize AuNPs under an overlayer of CB[n]s for catalysis, sensing, and drug delivery.