Catalytic aftertreatment is commonly used to reduce regulated gas emissions from Internal Combustion (IC) engines. Achieving fast catalyst light-off has always been a challenge for automobile IC engine applications. This paper experimentally studied the thermal management and regulated gas emissions from a Spark Ignition (SI) engine with Dynamic Skip Fire (DSF®) technology during cold start period.
The study has found that DSF can increase exhaust gas temperature at the catalyst inlet by up to 100°C, and the exhaust enthalpy by up to 20%. Cold start tailpipe carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrocarbon (HC) emissions can be reduced by 10% to 20% largely due to the increased exhaust gas temperature and enthalpy. Dynamic air pumping can further increase exhaust gas temperature by 30 °C, and can nearly double enthalpy delivered to the catalyst, which reduces cold start HC emissions by more than 50%.
