Development of a Passive Regeneration Diesel Particulate Filter System for an Agricultural tractor Engine

This paper presents the development and evaluation of a passive regeneration Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) system for a 4-cylinder, 3.18-liter naturally aspirated agricultural tractor engine based on the mDI engine family. The primary objective is to significantly reduce particulate matter (PM) emissions while maintaining optimal engine performance and fuel economy. The passive regeneration DPF system leverages the engine's operating conditions to generate sufficient heat for the oxidation of trapped particulate matter, eliminating the need for active regeneration techniques. The paper details the design process, including the selection of DPF material, filter geometry, and integration into the exhaust system. Rigorous experimental testing was conducted to assess the performance of the DPF system under various engine load and speed conditions. Results demonstrate substantial reductions in PM emissions without compromising engine power, torque, or specific fuel consumption. This novelty of this work lies in developing a new engine capacity from a legacy engine architecture and then develop from an inline pump fuel injection system to make it compatible for Common rail technology and at the same time integrate a DOC+DPF after treatment system. The development also enhanced the maximum torque capability and improve the noise characteristics of the engine. The work also included developing the engine with 2 different after treatment system suppliers, 2 different EGR system suppliers, 2 different Fuel injection system suppliers and yet meet the engine performance and efficiency requirements. Thus, with this we successfully developed the legacy Mahindra engine Platform and made it ready for future emission norms without compromising on fuel efficiency and performance requirements of the application.