Research on cooling system for 4-cylinder diesel engine

Coolant flow and its heat transfer directly affect the cooling efficiency, thermal load of heated components as well as thermal efficiency of diesel engine. An efficient approach to study cooling system for diesel engine is 3D CFD calculation for coolant jacket and 1D cooling system simulation.

The velocity, pressure and heat transfer coefficients (HTC) distribution in the coolant jacket of a 4 cylinder diesel engine are computed by 3D CFD approach using AVL/FIRE software. The improved schemes can be put forward according to calculating results. The boundary condition of 1D cooling system for diesel engine can be obtained by averaging computed inlet and outlet total pressure drop and heat transfer coefficients from CFD calculation. The parameters of the engine, which are fitted with the vehicle such as capacity of radiator, fan and water pump, could be decided. Software FLOWMASTER2 and EXCEL are utilized to simulate the cooling system under different environment temperatures and different speeds of water pump. Therefore computer simulation can optimize cooling system performance.