The Effect of Engine Operating Conditions on Engine-out Particulate Matter from a Gasoline Direct-injection Engine during Cold-start.

This work investigates the effect of engine operating conditions and exhaust sampling conditions (i.e. dilution ratio) on engine-out, nano-scale, particulate matter emissions from a gasoline direct-injection engine during cold-start and warm-up transients. The engine used for this research was an in-line four cylinder, four stroke, wall-guided direct-injection, turbo-charged and inter-cooled 1.6 l gasoline engine. A fast-response particulate spectrometer for exhaust nano-particle measurement up to 1000 nm was utilized, along with a spark-plug mounted pressure transducer for combustion analysis. It was observed that the total particle count decreases during the cold-start transient, and has a distinct relationship with the engine body temperature. Tests have shown that the engine body temperature may be used as a control strategy for engine-out particulate emissions. This work has identified that up to 95 % of particles emitted during the cold-start transient are in the 5-23 nm size range. It is also evident that the dilution ratio of the exhaust sample has a significant effect on the particulate matter number and size distribution.