From January 2009 the new PROCONVE L5 emissions legislation will be in place in Brazil, reducing significantly the current emissions levels. In order to comply with this new legislation, all automakers have to take actions on hardware and electronic fuel injection calibration to meet these new standards. Hardware changes can be efficient, such as increasing the amount of precious metals in the catalyst; however, the cost penalty may turn it unfeasible.
The objective of this text is to introduce how an efficient electronic fuel injection calibration, focused on emissions control can be a decisive way to reduce overall product cost. The influence of electronic fuel injection becomes more evident in the current Brazilian reality, where the overwhelming majority of vehicle sales are flexible fuel powered, increasing the challenge and difficulty to correctly control emissions.
The text shows the hardware changes that aim combustion stability, generating lower raw emissions of HC, CO and NOx, and focus on electronic fuel injection calibration to optimize cost and to refine combustion management. The lessons learned during the development, methods to control the gases, ways of optimizing the cold and hot EPA-75 Phases, influences and difficulties of each fuel blend - E22, E63 and E93 - and also the methods of evaporative emissions control are described and analyzed.