Development of an Internal Combustion Alcohol Fueled Engine

Alcohol is already known to be an important fuel alternative, and latest technology improvements, as well as the dynamic behavior of market and consumer mindset driven developments, allowed major improvements on the design guidelines, leading to a different decision matrix for accomplishment of technical improvements to reach current customer and market requirements.

This paper will present highlights and overall improvements achieved on the development of the Ford Zetec RoCam SOHC 1.6L MPFI I4 alcohol fueled engine (Hydrated Ethanol). The base gasoline fuelled engine program was designed from its concept to be flexible and robust to operate worldwide (being its original Launch in 1999 for the Brazilian and Mercosul markets) with different types of gasoline specifications, and the alcohol application is detailed, including the description of the major results. An Engineering design validation plan was established and protected the reliability and robustness of the necessary changes on the base gasoline project. It was carried out to detect possible boundary conditions that would not be considered on base program to fully certify the hydrated ethanol fuel application.