Performance and Emissions of a 0.273 Liter Direct Injection Diesel Engine Fuelled with Neat Dimethyl Ether

An experimental study is presented in which the use of neat dimethyl ether (DME) in a small non-turbo-charged diesel engine is demonstrated. It was found that with only minor fuel system modifications, DME gave very satisfactory combustion, performance and emissions. Engine operation with thermal efficiency equivalent to diesel fuel was achieved with much lower NO_x emissions and with extremely low smoke and less engine noise.

Additional NO, reductions were obtained by the use of EGR, without visible smoke and without deterioration in thermal efficiency, A limited durability study showed that the diesel fuel injection pump could operate on DME for more than 500 hours. A comparison of pure and technical grade DME was conducted.