A Novel Physical Approach for Wall Heat Transfer in Internal Combustion Engines

The estimation of wall heat losses is difficult in combustion chambers, and particularly in piston engines, because current heat transfer models are not universally applicable. And yet, heat losses are of great interest for engine thermal balance or Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). Thus, unlike previous correlations that are based on macroscopic Fluid Mechanics, an innovative model is elaborated from an atomic-scale study of gas-wall interaction. This model is validated for turbulent combustion in piston engines, and also for laminar combustion in two spherical vessels. The theoretical basis of this model is confirmed by the variety of operating conditions investigated, such as pressure.