Ethanol Diesel Truck Engine

Taking into account the demands for renewable and clean fuels and therefore the success of Ethanol use in Brazilian Flex-Fuel vehicles, the development of a new Ethanol-Diesel System would be also of big interest for mobility engineering. Previous investigations have already studied the Ethanol effect on Diesel engine combustion but applying different kinds of solution. In general they have investigated the combustion behavior regarding the Ethanol-Diesel emulsified in tank or the Ethanol mono-point fumigated and controlled mechanically. From the market and emissions laws point of view these solutions are not so convenient considering the advance of technology on modern vehicles. This work relates the development of a new prototype to investigate the Ethanol multi-point injection controlled electronically in the air intake manifold of a Common Rail HSDI Diesel engine. It describes the integration of both injection systems as well as the electronics applied to allow the Ethanol injection synchronized to the Diesel combustion. In comparison to the previous studies, this kind of configuration has the advantage to make possible the investigation of a higher number of parameters which associated to the more accurate injections control have interesting effects on the combustion. Experimental measurements have been carried out in an engine test bench in order to investigate the Diesel-Ethanol combustion behavior. The results of these tests are compared to the original Diesel combustion. From the experimental data, it is shown that Ethanol-Diesel combustion brings relevant benefits: fuel consumption and engine thermodynamic efficiency are improved with positive effects on smoke, Nox and combustion noise.