Browse Topic: On-board energy sources

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Transient gas-liquid two-phase flow in aero-engine fuel pipelines was examined using numerical simulations, focusing on the influence of flow rate on phase change behavior. Under low-flow conditions, phase change occurred repeatedly near the pipe wall, where vapor layers formed and collapsed in an intermittent manner. These processes introduced noticeable unsteadiness in the local mass flow and pressure fields. When the flow rate was increased, vapor generation was largely confined to a narrow region adjacent to the wall, and the overall flow exhibited a more stable character. The results suggest that flow-rate-dependent phase change plays an important role in determining the stability of fuel transport and should be considered in the fire safety assessment of aircraft fuel systems.
Wu, BinXin, BoZeng, TaiSu, Zhengliang
NASA Tech Briefs: August 202626AERP088/8/2026
How Electrification is Reshaping Motion Control in Flight Systems Charting the Flight Path of the Aerospace & Defense Industry with Digitalization Introducing the Modern Virtual Test Environment: Reducing Friction in RDT&E How Modular Tooling Accelerates Thermoplastic Composite Prototyping for Advanced Air Mobility and Defense Aerospace-Grade Thin Film Substrates: The Foundation of Electronics Reliability This New Quantum Sensor Measures 3D Direction of RF Electromagnetic Fields SAE International Publishes New Technical Information Report to Advance Battery Interoperability for Small Uncrewed Aerial Systems SAE JA1016 establishes common specifications for lithium-ion pouch cells for small uncrewed systems in both ground and aerial applications. Engineering Actuators for Extreme Environments A holistic approach to protective design can greatly reduce or eliminate the harmful effects of harsh environmental conditions on electric actuators. Texas A&M Researchers Work to Find Jet Fuel Alternatives Through a NATO sponsorship, a team of aerospace engineering researchers will start testing hydrogen-based alternatives that produce vapor and steam instead of carbon dioxide when they burn. Prototype Reflectarray Antenna Demonstrates Low-SWaP Anti-Jam Tactical SATCOM This prototype array uses a small, lightweight, low-power, and low-cost aperture. How Airbus is Developing Artificial Intelligence for Future Cockpits Computer vision, automated landing and embedded AI for tomorrow's cockpits.
This study investigates the convective heat transfer mechanism in the unlocking process of magnesium strip-based solid propellant mechanisms, supported by numerical simulations. Through developing a multiphysics coupled model for the unlocking mechanism, we analyze magnesium strip fracture and unlocking processes, revealing how convective heat transfer affects unlocking duration. The simulation results demonstrate excellent agreement with experimental data, providing theoretical guidance for engineering design of magnesium strip-based solid propellant systems.
Wang, HaoxuZhong, Jianlin
The energy management strategy of hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) is critical to achieving overall vehicle efficiency. Current global optimization methods involve significant computational complexity. Conventional or adaptive equivalent consumption minimization strategy (ECMS) also presents challenges in robustness and calibration efficiency, as it typically depends on real-time driving condition recognition and online parameter adjustment. To address these issues, this study proposes an engineering optimization framework based on a system efficiency lookup table approach. This method uses offline iterative simulation to determine a globally representative equivalent factor. It pre-computes optimal system efficiency, drive modes, and energy allocation across the entire operating range. These results are stored in a lookup table that the vehicle control unit (VCU) can access in real time. This approach eliminates the uncertainties associated with online optimization. It also provides calibration engineers with a quantitative tool to directly balance competing objectives, such as fuel economy and NVH. The optimized strategy increases the proportion of electric and parallel mode operation. This concentrates engine operating points within the high-efficiency zone and significantly reduces losses from multi-stage energy conversion. Simulations, dynamometer tests, and real-world road tests confirm the strategy’s effectiveness and repeatability. The approach achieves a fuel consumption reduction of approximately 0.2 L/100 km, with all test coefficients of variation (CV) remaining below 5%. The framework demonstrates good extensibility and can be adapted to different architectures, such as plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and fuel cell vehicles (FCVs). It offers a universal and efficient engineering solution for optimizing energy consumption in hybrid powertrain systems.
Lin, HaoqiangWang, JinhangChen, LihuaLi, Huan
In the present work, a novel method that combines accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) and gas chromatography coupled with triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry (GC-MS/MS) was proposed to identify and quantify polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in gasoline soot. The n-hexane was employed to extract the target analytes, and the optimal extraction conditions were identified (cycle times = 3, extraction time = 30 min, extraction temperature = 120°C, and extraction pressure = 100 MPa). The extraction efficiency of six analytes was measured to assess the ASE method; the formation mechanism of partial PAHs was discussed, and the 18 PAHs in gasoline soot were studied both qualitatively and quantitatively under the optimal conditions. It was found that our new method reached a high correlation coefficient (between 0.9987 and 0.9997); the limits of quantification (LOQs) (S/N = 6) for these PAHs were between 0.003 and 0.009 ng/mL with a relative standard deviation (RSD) of 2.9–10.6%. Our method demonstrated good performance in determining the target analytes in soot samples, such as gasoline soot, some materials soot, co-combustion soot, gasoline, and materials. The PAHs differences in soot samples containing gasoline and materials soot samples were significant enough to obtain the observed discrimination. The method is an accurate and sensitive quantitative method to identify gasoline residues in soot samples of arson fire.
Liu, ShujunCao, HenanQi, LijieLiu, YangLi, Qi
Amid growing society concerns about environmental sustainability, fuel consumption has become a key factor in mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, modern vehicle design increasingly prioritizes aerodynamic drag reduction. However, aerodynamic enhancements can significantly affect brake cooling, since airflow distribution plays a crucial role in braking performance. This study explores the interplay between underbody aerodynamic features and brake cooling efficiency in production vehicles. Three body styles—compact sedan, midsize SUV, and minivan—were evaluated to determine how varying aerodynamic configurations influence airflow around the wheel assemblies. The findings highlight critical trade-offs between aerodynamic optimization and thermal management, offering valuable insights for achieving balanced vehicle development strategies.
Batista, LorenaMotta, DanielSeren, EricsonBergel, AndréSarmento, AlissonTerra, Rafael
The driving cycle is the basic model of certification of vehicle fuel consumption and emissions, or calibration of powertrains. Standard regulatory driving cycles, such as WLTC, in general assume flat roads during their generation and fail to take into account the strong effect that road gradients have on vehicle operation and driving energy consumption. Such a shortcoming, then, leads to gross mismatches in adaptability when used for urban environments with typical hilly topography. To solve this problem, in this paper, we proposed a method for building driving cycles that consider the impact of slope with actual driving data. Initially, high-precision onboard data collectors were used to generate a total sum of 21, 350 km of driving data from the Munich area, thus creating a diversified driving data set with details such as vehicle speed, slope, and environmental information. Subsequently, joint probability distributions of “speed-acceleration” and “slope-slope change rate” are proposed by using the Micro-trip Method, and a novel chi-squared test algorithm is used to obtain a higher fidelity of urban driving cycle representative of typical conditions. Results of the driving cycle results show that the driving cycle built was close to the actual kinematics, indicating a deviation of less than 5%, and can capture the average uphill characteristic of 1.7%, which is quite well represented. Finally, in fact, validation of whole vehicle environmental chamber tests further demonstrates that the energy consumption prediction error of the developed driving cycle is just 2.2%, much lower than 19.1% error of WLTC. It highlights the importance of considering slope parameters in improving the accuracy of energy consumption calibration for an EV operating on complex slope terrains. Furthermore, it underscores that converting the real-world driving data into lab-based driving cycles can reduce the cost and time of actual road tests for Chinese companies going to the overseas markets, thereby offering support for the international marketing strategy of a global database.
Tian, LichenJiang, PingGao, WangLiang, YongkaiMa, KunqiYu, Hanzhengnan
Violent shaking induced by motion excitation in a dynamic environment can generate significant additional forces and moments in liquid propellants, affecting spacecraft stability and attitude control. This study employs the CEL method to establish a fluid-structure interaction model for a launch vehicle fuel tank. The penalty function approach addresses FSI and hinged contact behavior, while the control volume method quantifies liquid pressure on anti-sloshing plates and propellant volume changes. Initial filling angles were used to simulate motion excitation equivalently. For partial filling conditions, the effects of equivalent filling height, initial filling angle, and anti-shake plate thickness on impact resistance were analyzed. Results indicate that at a fixed initial liquid filling angle, increasing the equivalent liquid filling height elevates both the maximum pressure and displacement of the anti-sloshing plate, though the rate of increase diminishes with greater plate thickness. At a fixed equivalent liquid filling height, increasing the initial liquid filling angle raises the maximum pressure, while the enlarged liquid-solid contact volume suppresses propellant sloshing, thereby reducing the displacement of the anti-sloshing plate. This study provides theoretical support for the structural design of anti-sloshing plates in rocket tanks.
Jiang, LongxuanLe, Guigao
In an ever-evolving landscape of emission regulations, charging infrastructure, customer demands, fuel/energy costs and decarbonization goals, heavy-duty on-road vehicle manufacturers continue to evaluate alternative powertrain technologies. While most heavy-duty vehicle manufacturers now have battery electric vehicles (BEVs) in their portfolio, significant challenges of charging infrastructure, range anxiety, payload capacity reduction and upfront costs have contributed to their lower adoption rates. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) have significant potential of leveraging upcoming BEV infrastructure and component supply chains to reduce operating costs while still maintaining longer range and payload capacity benefits of conventional ICE powertrains. This article applies a model-based approach to evaluate multiple Class 7–8 heavy-duty powertrain configurations. A system-level (1D) model of the conventional diesel ICE-based truck was developed in GT-Suite and validated against on-road test data. Using the diesel ICE model as a baseline, system-level models for different hybrid configurations were adapted, and their powertrain architecture was optimized at the system level. Additionally, an equivalent consumption minimization strategy (ECMS) for energy management was also optimized for each of the hybrid powertrain configurations to maximize fuel efficiency and emission benefits. All the hybrid configurations were then compared against the conventional diesel ICE Class 8 truck in terms of performance (acceleration, top speed, gradeability and startability), fuel economy (real-world cycles and certification cycles), emissions, and range for long-haul applications. Unique to this approach is the simultaneous co-optimization of powertrain component sizing and supervisory control logic by utilizing a Genetic Algorithm–based optimization approach. Results indicate that all parallel hybrid architectures (P2, P2–P3, and P4) achieve performance (acceleration, top speed, gradeability, and startability) parity or improvement compared to baseline diesel architecture. P2-based architectures demonstrated a 12–14% improvement in fuel economy on representative real-world cycles when operating in a blended charge-depleting–charge-sustaining mode of operation, and a 4–6% improvement in fuel economy when operating in charge-sustaining mode alone. By quantifying these results across diverse topologies, this work addresses a significant research gap in the holistic evaluation of Class 8 hybrids, specifically, the trade-off between multi-speed electric drives, system-level mass increases, and real-world fuel economy, that remains underexplored in current literature.
Baburaj, AdithyaPaul, SumitDhanraj, FnuJoshi, SatyumFranke, Michael
This study investigates the knocking noise phenomenon in a marine dual-power dual-branch transmission gear system. Vibration mechanisms are analyzed, and potential failure modes are assessed. System vibration data were evaluated using time-domain and frequency-domain methods. Results show that overall vibration levels remained within acceptable limits, with no indication of imminent failure. Physical inspection confirmed that the shaft, gears, bearings, housing, and installation met specifications, with no observed performance degradation or structural damage. By correlating noise occurrence with vessel loading conditions, a strong relationship was identified among gear transmission torque, the power distribution ratio between high-and low-pressure turbines, and the onset of knocking. Specifically, under low-load conditions, uneven power and torque distribution among the four gear branches led to insufficient loading on the low-pressure side. This light-load state induced instability in the low-pressure gears, resulting in periodic tooth disengagement or back-side tooth contact, which is established as the root cause of the knocking noise.
Gu, ChengzhongXu, HanweiLuo, RirongRen, Fushan
Hydrogen-powered aircraft primarily utilize the conversion of liquid hydrogen into gaseous hydrogen to replace aviation kerosene, where hydrogen is directly combusted to provide propulsion. This study applied Amesim software to establish a complicated model simulating the liquid hydrogen to gaseous hydrogen conversion and ignition combustion processes. The simulation contains converting liquid hydrogen into gaseous hydrogen through a heat exchanger and simulating the mixture of gaseous hydrogen and air in the engine combustion chamber, and then igniting the mixture. The pressure, temperature, and flow rate of gaseous hydrogen and air during the ignition and combustion process in the engine combustion chamber, as well as the outlet temperature of the combustion chamber, are simulated and analyzed. The results demonstrate that during the simulation process, the internal pressure of the liquid hydrogen storage tank, the outlet pressure and flow rate of the liquid hydrogen pump, and the pressure and flow rate of gaseous hydrogen meet the requirements of the ignition combustion test. In addition, varying gaseous hydrogen flow rates had significant impacts on the temperature of the combustion chamber during combustion.
Gao, PengfeiWang, Lijian
In order to ensure that the high-caliber artillery ammunition fuses can successfully complete their combat tasks with high quality, it is necessary to optimize the design of their structure and conduct simulation verification of their performance. Through optimization design, this paper determined that the distance between the antenna plate and the wind cap of the proximity detonation module of the high-caliber artillery ammunition fuse is 6.2mm, and the thickness of the wind cap top is 12.9mm; it also determined that in the coaxial line feeding mode, a circular patch is used as the antenna shape, with the lowest return loss (reaching -38.5244 dB), which is conducive to the emission of electromagnetic wave energy; by introducing the methods and processes of intensity simulation analysis and aerodynamic thermal simulation analysis, as well as the methods of performance verification, this paper provides reference and guidance for the simulation analysis of similar systems.
Liu, LiwenSun, ZhangyiNing, QuanliCai, Canwei
Spacecraft with chemical propellant engines, especially spacecraft for exploring extraterrestrial objects, need to carry out plume tests on the ground in order to determine the influence of engine plumes on spacecraft. An important purpose of the plume test is to accurately measure the pressure field in key parts of the spacecraft. In this paper, according to the pressure measurement requirements of the spacecraft plume test, the design of a pressure measurement system is carried out, which mainly includes a pressure measurement sensor, a pressure difference measurement sensor, a pipeline, a cable, a measuring instrument, a data acquisition instrument, upper measurement software, and so on. The designed pressure measurement system was successfully applied to the plume impact test of Chang'e VII, which provided important technical support for the development of the spacecraft.
Wu, YueGuo, QinliangWu, DongliangLiu, XiaoningTao, DongxingLin, BoyingXie, ZhengWei, XiNiu, Tong
The mechanical behavior of a certain solid propellant is not only obviously related to time, temperature, and load loading history, but also is a viscoelastic plastic material under certain conditions. Based on the principle of creep deformation superposition, the strain of the solid propellant material is decomposed into a viscoelastic part and a viscoplastic part, and the nonlinearity of the viscoelastic-plastic constitutive model is manifested by the introduction of nonlinear coefficients. According to the characteristics of the viscoelastic-plastic model of the solid propellant material, the relevant tests were designed. The viscoplastic parameters were determined by using the creep recovery test data of multiple cycles until the failure of the propellant material sample. The viscoelastic parameters of the solid propellant material were obtained by using the data from recovery tests performed under different stress conditions.
Zhang, JianbinSui, JiulingYao, BaotaiCheng, DongLi, Yiming
To address the issue of point ignition efficiency caused by the dense packing of granular propellant in miniaturized ejection devices, this study determined that the ignition efficiency at the bottom of the small cartridge is sufficient to meet requirements. By combining the Blender physics engine with ANSYS SpaceClaim scripting and modeling technology, a three-dimensional random packing model was constructed. Fluent fluid-structure interaction simulations analyzed the effects of vertical, horizontal, and mixed drop methods on ignition characteristics. The Realizable k-epsilon turbulence model was used to simulate the transient flow of high-pressure gas, quantifying ignition efficiency by the fuel surface ratio. At a certain ignition pressure, it was found that the fuel surface ratio growth rate for vertical and mixed drop filling methods was higher (with differences < 3% within 0.25 ms). Further analysis indicated that horizontal drop filling led to an 8.7% reduction in the internal hole fuel surface ratio due to the axial alignment of the propellant particles with the ignition direction. The temperature field and flow velocity cloud diagrams showed that under the bottom ignition structure, gas can form a continuous high-temperature zone in disordered gaps, with a uniform propagation speed gradient in the vertical direction. The fuel surface formation time (0.25 ms) is much shorter than the combustion cycle (> 10 ms), and the differences in fuel surface ratio among the three filling methods have a limited impact on overall combustion.
Yu, RuiWang, XiaojunBai, LiqiangLi, Guoqin
This article focuses on a wide range of high-precision storage and supply systems. Under the rated flow rate of 2.928 mg / s of the proportional flow controller, the instantaneous flow fluctuation range of the BangBang valve reaches 2.963 mg / s, exceeding the control accuracy requirement of 1% for the proportional flow controller. By establishing mathematical models of the BangBang valve, proportional valve, and proportional flow controller for simulation analysis, the trend of the simulation results is consistent with the experimental results. Furthermore, considering the spatial layout and weight of the storage and supply system, this paper proposes a method to improve the accuracy of flow output by adding 180 mL of air capacity between the proportional valve and the proportional flow controller. Ultimately, the maximum flow fluctuation of the proportional flow controller at the moment of the BangBang valve opening and closing is 2.941 mg / s, which meets the control accuracy of the proportional flow controller. Moreover, the error between the output flow rate of the proportional flow controller and the rated working flow rate is minor after increasing the air capacity.
Li, ZhongYan, ZelongHuang, Tiankun
For large-bore marine methanol / diesel dual-fuel engines, this study investigates the formation characteristics of unregulated emissions through experimental methods and explores the mechanisms by which engine load and injection timing influence the emissions of unburned methanol and formaldehyde. The study was carried out on a supercharged intercooled inline six-cylinder engine, and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to monitor the exhaust composition in real time. The study shows that methanol released in the exhaust is due to the incomplete combustion of the methanol fuel. In the combustion process of methanol fuel, formaldehyde mainly arises from two pathways, the first of which is the partial oxidation of methanol inside the cylinder; secondly, the unburned methanol in the exhaust gas oxidizes in the exhaust pipe to generate formaldehyde. As the load increased from 25% to 100%, the unburned methanol emissions decreased by 29%, and formaldehyde emissions decreased by 71%. This is mainly attributed to the enhanced oxidation reaction and reduced wall crevice effect due to the increased combustion temperature. Methanol injection timing optimization was effective in controlling unregulated emissions, with methanol emissions lower at -7° CA ATDC and formaldehyde emissions reaching larger values under this condition. Delaying the diesel injection to -16°CA ATDC led to a 38% increase in unburned methanol emissions, caused by fuel spray interactions and longer stagnation, whereas formaldehyde emissions showed minimal change.
Jiang, YuqiLi, HongmeiZhang, WenzhengLi, XiaoZheng, LiangMeng, YangqianGu, XiananHua, Hanqing
Ammonia is receiving heightened attention as a carbon-neutral and hydrogen energy carrier alternative fuel for compression ignition engines. However, replacing diesel with ammonia poses significant challenges due to its low reactivity and slow-burning nature, particularly at low-load conditions. This study investigated the effect of ammonia energy share (AES) on the combustion characteristics and performance of an ammonia–diesel dual-fuel (ADDF) compression ignition engine operating under low loads and at a constant speed of 1800 RPM. The experiments were conducted at three different loads: 6 Nm, 13.5 Nm, and 18 Nm, corresponding to 11%, 25%, and 33% of full load, respectively. At each load, the AES was incrementally increased, ranging from zero to its maximum limit, while maintaining the COV of IMEP below 3% to ensure stable combustion. Furthermore, CFD simulations were performed using a CONVERGE CFD model of the engine to analyze the in-cylinder thermal and chemical behavior, and the model was validated against the experimental data. The experimental results showed that the AES reached 40%, 58%, and 61% for engine loads of 6 Nm, 13.5 Nm, and 18 Nm, respectively. Increasing AES reduced the mean in-cylinder temperature and peak cylinder pressure, and shifted the peak pressure location toward the expansion stroke. Combustion phasing was delayed, and combustion duration increased with higher ammonia substitution. CFD analysis revealed weaker high-temperature and OH reaction zones, along with reduced OH and H radical activity, and increased persistence of NH2 and HO2 evolution at higher AES, indicating slower oxidation of the ammonia-containing mixture. The results highlight the challenges associated with high-ammonia operation at low loads and provide deeper insight into the combustion processes governing ADDF engine performance.
Sardar, GobindaKishore, KislayPradeep, P.Mittal, Mayank
This document defines the technical guidelines for the safe integration of Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) Fuel Cell Systems (FCS), fuel (considered to be liquid and compressed hydrogen storage types only), fuel storage, fuel distribution and appropriate electrical systems into the aircraft. Editorial Note: Today PEM systems and fuel storage represent the most mature FCS technology and currently forms the basis for this standard. Other types of fuel cell systems and fuels (including reforming technologies and electrolyzers), may be covered by a further update to this document.
AE-7F Hydrogen and Fuel Cells
To solve a problem that ignition anomaly can’t be detected in time, based on the thermal equilibrium equation, the space heat flow, heater heating, propellant combustion, and thermal radiation to cryogenic space are considered to build an accurate ignition temperature method for the 10 N thruster by using on-orbit true temperature. Further, considering the error of measuring the thermistor, an envelope model for the 10 N thruster ignition temperature is established. Based on the above, a detection method for the 10 N thruster ignition anomaly of on-orbit satellites is proposed. The accuracy of the method is relatively high, and the absolute error is less than 3 degrees Celsius. An anomaly can be quickly detected when the 10N thruster ignition temperature deviates from the normal trend by 3–5 degrees celsius. The method is applied to a DFH-3 satellite, and the maximum difference of 10 N thruster ignition temperature between the theoretical values calculated by the proposed method and the measured values is only 2.72 degrees celsius. It has been proven that the prediction accuracy of the proposed method is high. It plays an important role in discovering the 10N thruster ignition anomaly in time and ensuring the success of satellite orbit or attitude control.
Li, LilingTian, HuadongWei, YuboFei, DiXing, Chao
To address the orbital design problem for cooperative observations with multiple spacecraft in small bodies exploration, this paper proposes an orbital design method that accounts for cooperative observation effectiveness, given the primary spacecraft’s orbital parameters and observation schedule. First, to accurately compute the visible regions on the small body surface, we develop a polyhedral equal-solid-angle resampling scheme based on the Hierarchical Equal Area iso-Latitude Pixelization (HEALPix), thereby constructing a pixel-based surface grid of the small body. Then, by taking the cooperative observed area ratio and the mean instantaneous field-of-view overlap ratio as effectiveness metrics, and the maneuver ΔV as a constraint, we formulate an optimization-based search strategy to solve for the optimal orbital configuration parameters within the search space. Numerical simulations show that the proposed method produces near-circular, non-coplanar configurations that satisfy both propellant use constraints and cooperative observation requirements, providing a useful reference for engineering design.
Cao, YilinZhu, Shengying
In this study, high-speed back-illuminated imaging and laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) methods were employed to investigate the impingement behavior of millimeter-sized single isooctane drops on a dry solid wall and various liquid films, including isooctane and glycerol solution films of different concentrations. Various fuel spray impingement scenarios in gasoline direct injection engines were examined. High-speed back-illuminated imaging was primarily used to examine the impact of fuel drops on a dry wall and a fuel film of the same composition as the drops. The LIF method was used to examine the impact of fuel drops on the glycerol solution film, allowing for the distinction between fuel drops and the glycerol solution film. The impingement behavior varied depending on the Weber number of the incident drop and the wall condition. When fuel drops impacted the solid dry wall vertically, they spread into a circular liquid film. The outer edge of the liquid film folded and bulged, and upon reaching the maximum spreading diameter, it maintained equilibrium and did not retract. When isooctane fuel drops impacted the isooctane film, they broke and splashed, with thinner films producing stronger splashes. Additionally, the Weber number of the fuel drops significantly influenced the crown shape and splashing after impact. The impingement behavior of fuel drops on the glycerol solution film was also investigated, focusing on the liquid film morphology after impact. Based on the experimental data, empirical correlations were established between the critical Weber numbers for transitions among different crown morphologies and the dimensionless film thickness under varying film viscosities.
Yang, TianLu, LiliGuo, ZongweiSong, EnzheYao, ChongNing, YilinKe, Yun
Series hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) employ an electric motor for propulsion, while the internal combustion engine operates solely as a generator under energy-efficient speed and load conditions. Owing to this architecture, series HEVs can achieve high fuel efficiency with a relatively simple control structure. However, conventional energy management systems (EMSs) often prioritize battery state-of-charge (SOC) stabilization, which can lead to frequent engine start–stop operations and unnecessary fuel consumption, particularly in short-trip driving. This study aims to enhance energy management performance in series HEVs by optimizing engine power generation timing based on predicted short-trip duration. A computationally efficient, rule-based prediction model is developed using real-world driving data, in which short-trip duration is estimated from vehicle speed and acceleration. Due to its low computational load, the proposed model is suitable for implementation in an onboard electronic control unit (ECU). The proposed control strategy initiates engine power generation when the battery SOC is low and the predicted trip duration is long, and suppresses generation when the SOC is sufficiently high or the predicted trip is short. A detailed vehicle model incorporating an engine, generator, electric motor, inverter, and battery is developed in Modelica to evaluate the proposed strategy. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed EMS significantly reduces the frequency of engine start–stop events, leading to fuel economy improvements of 3.6% under the WLTC (excluding the extra-high phase) and 13.4% in a real-world urban–rural driving cycle, compared with a commercialized baseline vehicle. These results confirm the effectiveness and practical applicability of the proposed EMS for passenger vehicle applications.
Mizushima, NorifumiSato, AkiraKuboyama, TatsuyaMoriyoshi, Yasuo
Methanol use in marine engines has the potential to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions, particulates, and greenhouse gas emissions. A turbocharged four-stroke marine diesel powerplant was converted to run as a double-DI (direct injection) diesel-methanol hybrid engine. Experimental studies using a non-premixed combustion scheme showed that higher methanol substitution ratios (MSR) led to increased peak heat release rates. The combustion process displayed distinctive two-phase behaviors. Increasing MSR caused retarded ignition timing, shortened combustion duration, and improved thermal efficiency. Combustion stability was significantly improved at higher MSR. Emissions results showed NOX and HC were increased in proportion to MSR, whilst particulate emissions and CO concentrations were inversely reduced. Methanol enrichment was found to enhance NOX and HC formation processes but also accelerate soot particulate decomposition and CO oxidation mechanisms.
Li, XiaoJiang, YuqiYan, PingZheng, LiangLi, HongmeiZhang, WenzhengChen, ChaoMan, Zhongguo
To mitigate the risks of runway incursions during aircraft transitions between closely spaced parallel runways, major hub airports globally have implemented End-Around Taxiway (EAT) as an effective safety solution. Operational data from leading international airports confirms that EAT installations have successfully enhanced surface safety while maintaining operational efficiency. However, the EAT involves a longer taxiing route, resulting in higher fuel consumption and pollutant emissions. This study takes the example of a set of closely spaced parallel runways at a domestic airport to analyze the ground taxiing process of arrival and departure flights, proposing a dynamic allocation strategy for EAT operations that can achieve energy conservation and emission reduction during the taxiing process. Through simulation, its effective operational performance is studied.
Wang, ZinanYe, Bojia
The global trend towards green and low-carbon development is that hydrogen fuel cells, as a new type of green power device, have the characteristics of zero emissions and no pollution. Its basic principle is that hydrogen fuel directly converts chemical energy into electrical energy through electrochemical reactions, achieving energy conversion between fuel cells and internal combustion engines, thereby providing sustained and stable power. The PEMFC has attracted significant attention due to advantages such as fast start-up times and long lifespans. However, excessive temperature during the reaction process of solid-state hydrogen proton fuel cells can lead to a decrease in efficiency. This article studies the temperature control device of solid-state hydrogen fuel cells and finds that active temperature control technology can achieve precise temperature regulation, but it consumes more energy; the passive temperature control scheme can reduce energy consumption, but the response speed to low-temperature start-up is limited; The application of intelligent algorithm fuzzy PID significantly improves the temperature control accuracy under dynamic loads and effectively enhances the hydrogen release rate.
Ma, YueyueLiu, JingyiShi, JianLu, ZhaonaBao, Xueqin
The virtualization of powertrain systems is a key enabler for modern powertrain development. While physics-based 0D/1D simulation models provide accuracy and interpretability, these models are typically computationally demanding, prolonging the development process and usage throughout the V-cycle. Moreover, achieving real-time-capable simulation models through model simplifications remains challenging, as it often leads to significant losses in accuracy. In contrast, data-driven approaches can achieve high computational efficiency without significantly compromising model accuracy. This opens the possibility for not only online control applications, such as model predictive control or reinforcement learning, but also for computational expensive offline control prototyping using ultrafast-running data-driven digital twins. This work focuses on the elaboration of a scalable methodology for the development of ultrafast-running powertrain models for stationary and transient engine operation. This includes the efficient generation of training data with great variance, data analysis, and preparation, an optimized partitioning method using the Jensen–Shannon distance, feature engineering, model training of a multilayer perceptron (MLP), a long short-term memory (LSTM), and gated recurrent unit (GRU) network, followed by the model evaluation using test data and the concluding model deployment. In order to demonstrate the concept, a calibrated 0D/1D model of a dual-fuel marine main engine provided by WinGD Ltd. for a pure car and truck carrier is utilized as the reference physics-based model. The case study provides a comprehensive examination of the development of ultrafast-running data-driven fuel consumption models in both stationary and transient engine operation. The results show that the proposed methodology yields robust results and minimizes the loss of accuracy to 1.80%–2.14% for the MLP predicting the steady-state fuel consumption and to 0.67%–0.96% (GRU) and 1.52%–1.68% (LSTM) for predicting the transient fuel consumption, while achieving a multiple 104-fold reduction of the real-time factor (RTF) on an identical CPU.
Weller, LouisZanelli, AlessandroYang, QiruiBrutsche, MartinGrill, MichaelKulzer, André Casal
Polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells represent one of the most promising solutions for decarbonizing powertrain technologies, as they can be employed as carbon-free electrical power source. However, performance degradation during their operating lifetime - caused among other factors by non-uniform reactant distribution and improper membrane humidification, which may lead to the formation of local hot spots - remains a significant challenge. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tools represent an effective approach for investigating the transport of oxygen and hydrogen within the cell and for optimizing the geometry of PEM fuel cell flow distributors. Thus, they can be exploited in order to improve the uniformity of current density and temperature distributions over the cell active area. In this work, a serpentine flow field PEM fuel cell is considered as test case. The distributor consists of a multi-pass serpentine flow-field composed of repeated sets of five parallel channels interconnected by transverse manifolds. First, an open-source simulation library based on the OpenFOAM framework is validated against the cell polarization curve experimental data. Subsequently, a parametric analysis of the most relevant geometric parameters characterizing the flow distributor, such as channel width, channel height and manifold geometry, is carried out to assess their influence on the overall cell performance, reactants and current density distribution. The results demonstrate that appropriate optimization of the manifold geometry leads to a more uniform flow field within adjacent channels in both the anodic and cathodic distributors, resulting in an overall optimization of the pressure drop over the manifold, resulting in more efficient cell considering a balance of plant point of view.
Bulgarini, MargheritaDella Torre, AugustoMontenegro, GianlucaBaricci, AndreaMereu, RiccardoLalangui Gallegos, Jose A.De La Morena, Joaquin
Fuel cell electric vehicles are described on cell, stack and system levels. In driving operation, multi-physics coupling across subsystems (reactant supply, humidification, thermal management, etc.) reshapes cell- and stack-level boundary conditions, impacting performance and degradation mechanisms. Isolated single-topic approaches on one specific level may have limited transferability, as cross-level interdependencies under changing operating conditions can negate improvements or shift limiting factors. This underscores the development of validation environments (VEs) that represent cross-level interactions and evolve as experimental evidence redirects research questions. Models such as the V-Model provide phase-oriented logic for developing VEs when validation scope, boundary conditions and acceptance criteria can be specified upfront and remain stable. However, in PEMFC VE development, experimental conclusions frequently reshape hypotheses, operating conditions and research topics across successive cycles. Consequently, existing approaches often provide limited methodological support for a traceable and repeatable evolution of VEs where iterative reconfiguration is essential. To address this need, we developed the Development Model of the Validation Environment (eMVU, German for Entwicklungsmodell der Validierungsumgebung) for PEMFC technology to enable a structured, model-based and iterative evolution of VEs. Embedded in the system triple of product engineering, the eMVU guides the iterative transformation of objectives into validation configurations (VCs) through model-based derivation of boundary conditions, test requirements and extension measures. It structures each development cycle into the five phases design, specification, implementation and commissioning, experiments and results processing, as well as derivation of measures with feedback of the resulting insights into the objectives of the subsequent cycle. The framework is demonstrated by realizing a fully functional baseline VE and deriving an additional VC enabling semi-automated operation across eMVU cycles. Their implementation and operation provide experimental evidence that both the eMVU and the resulting VE enable traceable, repeatable and targeted assessment of cross-level interdependencies with measurable impact on cell and stack behavior.
Knaier, JohannesBause, KatharinaAlbers, Albert
Hybrid electric vehicles rely heavily on battery pack power capability, which is often compromised by non-uniform aging and thermal gradients. Conventional battery models typically use bulk state-of-health metrics, failing to capture localized degradation that leads to current imbalances and reduced pack utility. This paper presents a multi-scale modelling framework that integrates Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy data into a fractional-order equivalent circuit model to simulate localized degradation in Lithium Iron Phosphate cells. Results show that the terminal voltage of LFP cells can be accurately modelled using the proposed fractional-order equivalent circuit with a discrete transfer-function implementation, maintaining root-mean-square errors below 20 mV across most state-of-health and state-of-charge conditions. The validated cell model is then extended to a degradation-aware battery pack representation. The battery pack in this work utilizes a 200-kWh, 800 V architecture consisting of five modules connected in parallel, each module composed of 13 parallel strings of 250 series cells, evaluated under multiple degradation scenarios. By integrating this pack model into a Class-8 series hybrid powertrain simulation, this study quantifies how cell-to-cell heterogeneity impacts vehicle performance under the VECTO regional delivery drive cycle. At the vehicle level, these battery constraints influence engine duty cycles and battery pack stress metrics. When localized degradation reaches up to 40% in one module while the remaining modules degrade up to 20% to 30%, such inhomogeneous degradation reduces the minimum pack terminal voltage by approximately 27% and increases peak discharge current by more than 30%, resulting in more rapid degradation. These battery-level limitations translate into higher fuel consumption by up to 6% in a charge-sustaining scenario.
Safavi, Seyed RezaHomayouni, HoomanShoa, TinaWang, JasonMcTaggart-Cowan, Gordon
Knocking combustions in an Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) are engine damaging combustions, and reliable detection of each knocking event is very critical. Engines usually rely on piezo-electric knock sensors to monitor structure-borne noise, which outputs a complex, continuous time series signal. Typically, knock combustions have an additional noise component along with the regular combustion signal, but differentiation of knocking vs non knocking signal (signal to noise ratio) based on visual inspection of this signal alone is challenging and requires computationally intense signal processing such as Fast Fourier Transforms (FFT) or Wavelet transforms followed by manual calibration [1]. In this paper, we propose an alternative to replace traditional knock detection with more reliable time-domain alternative signal decomposition technique. Here we decompose the raw sensor signal into seasonality, trend, and residual, and use the residual component as it is seen to retain abnormalities in the signal during knocking combustion. Further, based on the amplitude of the residual, we can easily classify the combustions as low, medium, high or very high knocking events thus providing a precise and reliable detection.
Parulekar, Tushar A.Chilukuri, SandeepMahmood, Haneefa
Numerical analysis was conducted to investigate abnormal combustion, a major challenge in efforts to improve hydrogen engine efficiency. Focusing on two factors that induce abnormal combustion—surface reactions and lubricating oil—numerical analysis examined the potential for each to trigger abnormal combustion. Furthermore, since it was confirmed that the autoignition prediction using a detailed chemical reaction mechanism deviates from experiments at temperatures around 800K, attempts were made to improve this issue. As a result, it was confirmed that surface reactions affect the chemical species ratio near the wall surface but have little effect on flame propagation. Regarding lubricating oil, two possibilities were investigated: the lubricating oil itself self-igniting and becoming an ignition source for the hydrogen mixture, and deposits generated from the lubricating oil generating heat and becoming an ignition source. The results of these investigations showed that autoignition occurs before top dead center in both cases: when lubricating oil is present in the mixture during the compression stroke and when deposits heated to high temperatures are present. This indicates that engine oil can induce pre-ignition. Furthermore, the effect of water vapor on ignition delay was investigated. Finally, it was confirmed that incorporating corrections for molecules possessing kinetic energy deviating from the Maxwell distribution under low-temperature, high-pressure conditions into the reaction rate calculation improves the prediction accuracy of autoignition around 800 K.
Moriyoshi, YasuoYamane, TaichiWang, ZhiyuanKuboyama, Tatsuya
This paper assesses the efficiency limits of light-duty vehicle propulsion systems based on reciprocating internal combustion engines (ICE) in the current state of the art and in the next five-year horizon, considering their combination with technologies such as electric turbocharging and hybridization, while excluding plug-in hybrid configurations so that fuel remains the primary onboard energy source. A systematic methodology is applied to evaluate the influence of key variables—heat transfer, air–fuel ratio, and compression ratio—on engine performance, integrating these variations into a simulation model to capture their interactions and effects. The resulting parametric study enables the generation of new engine maps that exploit synergies between parameters and enhance the prediction of engine behaviour across different operating conditions, forming the basis for assessing potential advancements in hybrid powertrain architectures. These maps are then used to define performance expectations for hybrid vehicles, identifying optimal parameter combinations to guide future technology development and improve efficiency in hybrid powertrain design. The proposed powertrain architectures are integrated into a representative vehicle model, considering two vehicle typologies: a compact passenger car and a sport utility vehicle (SUV). To quantify the potential fuel-consumption benefits, an intelligent energy-management algorithm is implemented to supervise and optimize system operation over a WLTC driving cycle. The results indicate that the proposed configurations can achieve fuel-consumption reductions exceeding 20%, demonstrating the effectiveness of both the powertrain designs and the control strategies. Overall, the findings highlight the significant efficiency potential of advanced ICE-based propulsion systems when combined with near-term technologies such as electric boosting and hybridization, confirming the viability of these improvements and providing a robust basis for future hybrid vehicle development focused on maximizing energy efficiency in transportation.
Pla, BenjaminDolz, VicenteSerrano, Jose R.Gómez-Vilanova, AlejandroOliva, FerminCardenas, MariaAriztegui, Javier
The mitigation of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions poses a major challenge for the transportation sector, driving the need for renewable fuels. Bioethanol represents a promising fuel for Spark-Ignition (SI) engines, combining a reduced life-cycle CO₂ impact with advantageous combustion properties. However, despite its proven performance under steady-state conditions, the widespread of fuels with high ethanol content is still constrained by significant difficulties during engine cold-start operation. This study aims to experimentally assess the effect of ethanol concentration on cold-start performance and warm-up transient behavior of a Naturally Aspirated (NA), Port Fuel Injected (PFI) SI engine. Warm-up tests were conducted at an operating condition of 2000 rpm engine speed and 20 Nm torque using three fuels with increasing ethanol content: commercial gasoline (E5), E30 and E60. In addition, dedicated startability tests were carried out for E60 and neat ethanol (E100) at different initial engine wall temperatures to evaluate fuel sensitivity to thermal conditions during engine start. The experimental results indicate that increasing ethanol concentration has a negligible effect on the overall duration of the warm-up process, while leading to a modest reduction in both engine wall and exhaust gas temperatures. At the same time, E100 displays severe startability limitations at low initial wall temperatures, requiring repeated cranking attempts before stable operation can be achieved. The same startability issues have been observed for E60 but with limited intensity. Two minimum engine wall temperature ranges were identified for reliable cold-start operation at 20-25 °C for E60 and 25-30°C for E100. Overall, these findings experimentally confirm the dominant influence of engine thermal conditions on the reliable startability of ethanol-fueled spark-ignition engines.
Falbo, LuigiFalbo, BiagioPerrone, DiegoCastiglione, Teresa
Biodiesel blends (B7, B20, B100) were evaluated in a Stage V-compliant SCR on Filter (SCRoF) system for heavy-duty applications to quantify soot reactivity and filter regeneration capability. Compared to conventional diesel (B7), B20 showed slightly faster regeneration performance under real-driving conditions, while B100 resulted in reduced particulate formation and higher soot reactivity, with more intense exothermic events requiring careful management. These differences are attributed to the distinct physical-chemical properties of the fuels (oxygen content, lower heating value) and their interaction with Diesel Oxidation Catalyst (DOC)/SCRoF. All tests were conducted on an engine dynamometer with a Cursor 9 FPT (Fiat Powertrain). Findings are discussed in the context of EU Stage V limits and practical control strategies for heavy-duty applications.
Costa, Simone
This study investigates Gasoline Compression Ignition (GCI), a family of advanced combustion strategies that can be used to achieve low engine-out criteria pollutant emissions in the heavy-duty transportation sector. In particular, high fuel stratification GCI (HFS-GCI) has been shown to have high thermal efficiencies while maintaining a highly controllable and responsive mixing-controlled combustion event. However, stable combustion at low loads has been shown to be the principal challenge to the implementation of HFS-GCI in production applications. It has also been observed that several strategies that achieve stable combustion at low loads result either in increased emissions or efficiency penalties. While the achievement and maintenance of high enough exhaust temperatures for efficient aftertreatment operation is a significant challenge at low loads even for traditional diesel engine operation, this challenge is exacerbated by the low reactivity and colder flame temperature of gasoline. In recent single-cylinder and 1D simulation studies, fuel cutout strategies have been proposed as an enabling strategy to simultaneously improve combustion stability at low loads and increase exhaust temperatures. In this study, fuel cutout strategies are studied in a prototype multicylinder heavy-duty GCI engine based on a Cummins ISX15 diesel engine. Steady-state engine studies are conducted at warm and cold idle conditions to identify combinations of cylinders that provide the most benefit. NOx and soot limits are set and the performance of cutout strategies are compared to a pre-optimized baseline. The most optimal strategies from steady-state testing are then implemented under transient test cycle conditions similar to those required under United States regulatory testing. The strategies were found to offer simultaneous improvements in stability, fuel consumption, criteria pollutants, and turbine outlet temperature. The choice of cylinders whose fuel supply was cut was seen to be important in realizing the observed benefits. The use of fuel cutout strategies offered optimal performance at all the conditions considered, offering an additional lever to improve the performance of HFS-GCI and highlighting a promising pathway to the use of gasoline-like fuels as alternatives to diesel in heavy-duty engines.
Viswanathan, Aravindh BabuZhang, YuMerritt, Brock
Stochastic preignition (SPI) or low-speed preignition (LSPI) is an abnormal combustion phenomenon observed in downsized turbocharged direct-injection spark-ignition engines at highly boosted conditions. SPI results from the ignition of the air-fuel mixture from a fuel or oil droplet or a detached deposit before the spark discharge, and its occurrence can lead to extremely high peak pressures and severe knock, which can cause physical damage to the engine. This phenomenon limits the downsizing and boosting potential of direct-injection spark-ignition engines, thereby constraining the efficiency benefits that can be achieved. The propensity for SPI to occur is impacted by engine operating conditions as well as the properties of the fuel, fuel additives, lubricant, and lubricant additives. To mitigate its occurrence, it is important to understand the factors that impact the frequency of SPI events. As this abnormal combustion phenomenon is relatively recent, there was a lack of a standard procedure to detect the impact of a parameter on SPI frequency. This study details the development and validation of an engine dynamometer test procedure—the TOP TIER™ Standardized Dynamometer Test Method to Evaluate Additized Detergent Gasoline for SPI—approved by the Center for Quality Assurance (CQA), to evaluate gasoline additives for their impact on SPI. In this project, the newly validated SPI test protocol was used to compare the relative SPI tendencies of four TOP TIER™ fuel additives at maximum retail concentration against unadditized SPI test fuel, which served as the baseline. All four fuel additives were tested three times in randomized order. The results revealed that none of the TOP TIER™ additives tested had a statistically significant impact on the SPI rate.
Gopujkar, SiddharthDavis, RichardWorm, JeremyTuma, NicShukla, PrajwalReilly, VeronicaChapman, ElanaCiaravino, JosephSeyfried, Philipp
This study focuses on a hydrogen ejector for a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) with a maximum power of 150 kW. Experimental tests were conducted to obtain the operating parameters of the stack under 100 kW and 150 kW conditions, which were used as simulation boundary conditions. A three-dimensional numerical model of the ejector was established and validated. Based on this model, the effects of key structural parameters—including nozzle throat radius (Rnt ), nozzle position (NXP), mixing chamber radius (Rm ), diffuser outlet radius (Rde ), secondary flow inlet radius (Rs ), suction chamber radius (Rf ), and constant-pressure mixing chamber length (Lpm )—on ejector performance were systematically analyzed. The results indicate that Rnt and Rf are negatively correlated with ejector performance, while Rs and Lpm are positively correlated. In contrast, NXP, Rm , and Rde exhibit an optimal range, leading to a single-peak characteristic in ejector performance. This research provides a theoretical basis and design reference for the structural optimization of high-power fuel cell ejectors.
Liu, GuoqingTai, ShupengXi, FuqiangLi, ZongjiJi, ShaoboWang, XiuyuWei, Hui
Understanding the physiological impact of vehicle electrification on operators remains an important but underexplored issue in commercial vehicle research. This study quantitatively evaluates the physiological fatigue of drivers and onboard crew members during real-world operation of commercial refuse-collection vehicles by comparing a diesel-powered vehicle with a fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV). Both vehicles were operated on the same routes under comparable real-world operating conditions, including similar time periods and operational tasks, during municipal waste collection service. Heart Rate Variability (HRV) metrics were obtained from R-R interval (RRI) data recorded using a Polar heart rate sensor. The Root Mean Square of Successive Differences (RMSSD), a time-domain index reflecting short-term parasympathetic activity, and Poincaré (Lorenz) plot area (LP area), a nonlinear HRV index reflecting overall autonomic nervous system modulation, were calculated. In-cabin vibration and noise levels were also measured as supplementary context to support the interpretation of physiological responses. The results indicate that both RMSSD and LP area were higher during FCEV operation than during diesel vehicle operation. For the driver, RMSSD increased by approximately 61.65% and the LP area by approximately 49.91%. For the onboard crew member, RMSSD increased by approximately 18.79% and the LP area by approximately 46.02%. These findings suggest a consistent association between reduced vibration and noise characteristics in the FCEV and increased HRV indices, indicating reduced physiological fatigue during operation. This study provides quantitative evidence that fuel cell electric commercial vehicles are associated with improved occupational conditions, extending beyond conventional environmental benefits.
Utsumi, AtsukoYakoh, Takahiro
The clearance between the impeller and pump head is a critical parameter of the hydrogen recirculation pump used in proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) systems, and it significantly affects performance, efficiency, and reliability. This study investigates the impact of clearance on the performance of a hydrogen recirculation pump applied in PEMFC systems. Both numerical simulation and experimental methods are employed to systematically evaluate the effects of symmetric circular clearances ranging from 0 to 0.4 mm, as well as asymmetric clearance configurations representative of manufacturing tolerances and assembly deviations. According to the research results, the pressure rise increases with the clearance decreasing under a given flow rate, and a smaller clearance would show a stronger capability to cover a larger flow rate range. The clearance impact on the performance of the hydrogen recirculation pump is found to be in the lower flow rate zone. In addition, the pressure distribution inside the hydrogen recirculation pump shows that the pressure would increase from the inlet to the outlet and increase along the circumferential direction of the impeller. The flow pressure at the inlet side is different from the flow pressure at the outlet side, which results in asymmetric clearance. And this brings a negative impact on the flow performance of the hydrogen recirculation pump. The flow performance capability of the hydrogen recirculation pump with the asymmetric clearance condition is not as good as that with a base clearance of 0.2 mm, and it is better than that with a clearance of 0.3 mm. When the flow rate is higher than 450 LPM, the clearance impact and the asymmetric clearance impact on the performance become insignificant. Based on a combined assessment of hydraulic performance and pressure stability, a clearance of approximately 0.2 mm is suggested as a potential optimal design target based on simulation results and observed trends. The simulation results show good agreement with experimental data, with deviations within 10% across the investigated operating conditions.
Xie, LuZhong, HaoTsoi, Jeffrey
Knowing a detailed operating cycle is critical for developing and testing equipment. Operating cycles can be separated by two clear distinctions: (1) regulatory or non-regulatory and (2) application at the engine-only or full machine level. The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Nonroad Transient Cycle (NRTC) may be a good representation of engine use in many types of equipment, but there is a gap in standardized and validated drive cycles specifically for nonroad material handlers. Lacking a standardized drive cycle makes it difficult to accurately benchmark machine performance and validate new powertrain technologies. The objective of this investigation is to illustrate the development of a custom drive cycle augmented with real-world customer use data that serves multiple purposes: (1) understand the range of operation and utilization that formulated inputs for electrified architecture analysis and (2) develop a repetitive and consistent maneuver to establish baseline energy consumption enabling equivalent comparison to future electrified prototype builds. This article presents a solution specifically for a 23-ton nonroad material handler in which material handling, machine transport, and extended idle were homologated to form representative short cycles defined by machine velocity and hydraulic cylinder position. The most intensive material handling short cycles had a load factor of 40% and an average fuel rate of 16 L/h. Combined with a visual aid, the short cycles exhibited low variability, having less than 5% root mean square (RMS) error in lift and reach position with respect to the average. The machine’s performance on these short cycles at the Advanced Power Systems Research Center (APSRC) was compared to results from two real-world customer locations operating the instrumented test machine in a cyclical manner, and for similar ground conditions were found to be comparable in fuel consumption.
Czarnecki, AlexanderGoodenough, BryantWorm, JeremyRobinette, DarrellLaTendresse, PhilWestman, John
Ethanol requires elevated intake temperatures to initiate autoignition in Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) as a high-octane single-stage fuel. To leverage the high thermal efficiency, low engine-out NOx, and near-zero soot inherent to HCCI with ethanol, a custom piston design was developed to enable high compression ratios (CR) up to 22.5:1. This study investigates HCCI combustion with ethanol at three CRs of 17.5, 20.0, and 22.5 through equivalence ratio and boost sweeps performed to assess the reduction in the intake temperature requirement at high CRs and the emissions and efficiency trade-offs. Results indicate a clear benefit with reduced intake temperature requirements with increasing CR. However, a combustion efficiency penalty was observed at high CRs. Three-dimensional Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations were performed using Large Eddy Simulation (LES) coupled with a detailed chemistry model to investigate the underlying mechanisms of the combustion efficiency penalty. CFD results reveal that the combustion efficiency penalty at high CR is primarily due to increased crevice mass trapping unburned or partially oxidized species and a rapid expansion effect inhibiting complete carbon monoxide (CO) oxidation.
Vedpathak, KunalKumar, MohitMotwani, RahulDatar, AdityaGainey, BrianLawler, Benjamin
Besides the electrification of the transport sector, the growing interest in alternative fuels for internal combustion engines represents a promising pathway to effectively decarbonize transportation over the coming decades. Predictive combustion models implemented within CFD frameworks are a critical tool to guide the design of next-generation internal combustion engines fuelled with alternative fuels. Accurate prediction of the combustion heat release process is influenced by multiple interacting parameters, requiring combustion models that can reliably adapt to variations in fuel chemical properties and operating conditions. In this study, two well-established combustion models considered to model combustion development in Spark-Ignition engine, namely the Extended Coherent Flame Model (ECFM) and the G-equation model, are compared to assess their capability to adapt to changes in fuel chemical composition. Both models, based on the flamelet formulation are deliberately tested beyond their nominal validity range in order to highlight their limitations when applied to a broader range of operating conditions in the case of ammonia-hydrogen blends as fuel. The numerical predictions are validated against an extensive experimental dataset obtained from a commercial light duty engine converted to single-cylinder configuration over a wide range of equivalence ratios. Both models require careful calibration of the turbulence–chemistry interaction to account for the large variability in mixture conditions (% vol. hydrogen in the blend, equivalence ratio) investigated. Furthermore, the calibration strategy is analysed in relation to the turbulent combustion regime classification. Under perfectly premixed operating conditions, as the combustion analysis is unaffected by in-cylinder stratification, the interpretation enables a direct assessment of the turbulence–chemistry interaction modelling.
Sola, RiccardoBaratta, MirkoMisul, DanielaRousselle, ChristineBREQUIGNY, PierreColin, Olivier
Emissions reduction remains a major concern for internal combustion engines in view of increasingly stringent environmental regulations. To address these challenges while maintaining acceptable engine performance, a wide range of alternative fuels and fuel blends have been investigated to ensure the continued viability of CI engines. This study reports the effects of blending the oxygenated fuel diethylene glycol diethyl ether (DGDE) with hydrotreated vegetable oil biodiesel (HVO) on engine performance and emissions. The investigation is conducted on a 2.3-liter, four-cylinder, common-rail diesel engine, equipped with a variable geometry turbocharger and a high-pressure exhaust gas recirculation system. The objectives of this study are achieved by developing a one-dimensional predictive engine model using the commercial GT-SUITE software. The engine model is developed and experimentally validated, at various operating conditions and HVO–DGDE fuel blends, to predict their effects on combustion characteristics and emissions formation. The validation is performed against measurements collected at the engine test bed. The results indicate that increasing the blending ratio of oxygenated fuel leads to improvements in indicated mean effective pressure and a more favorable Soot–NOx emissions trade-off compared with neat HVO operation. The findings highlight the potential of oxygenated fuel blends to enhance CI engine performance while reducing emissions. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of combining experimental and numerical approaches to evaluate biodiesel–oxygenated fuel blends and provides insights for future research aimed at minimizing CI engine emissions.
Arain, M Wajahat RasoolFoglia, AntonioFrasci, EmmanueleVitek, OldrichPianese, CesareArsie, Ivan
Heavy-duty vehicles significantly contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and urban air pollution, especially during cold-starts and transients when engine and aftertreatment efficiencies drop. Waste heat recovery (WHR) via Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) systems offers a practical solution to improve fuel efficiency and cut CO₂ in real-world heavy-duty operations. This study examines ORC-based WHR integration into conventional and hybrid powertrains of an Isuzu FTR850 truck, analyzing four configurations: Shell-and-Tube or Plate heat exchangers with simple or regenerative ORC layouts. For hybrids, it compares two engine sizes and energy management strategies: an optimized fuzzy logic approach versus constant-power operation to enhance exhaust heat recovery. A validated quasi-static simulation framework is used to predict fuel consumption and exhaust properties over representative duty cycles. 2D performance maps using exhaust temperature and mass flow as inputs are used to model the WHR under off-design conditions. Results show that the recovery of waste heat WHR depends on the hybridization level and strategy. Conventional powertrains benefit most from Shell-and-Tube exchangers, recovering ~2 kWh of electrical energy per 8-hour cycle and reducing fuel consumption by 0.5%. Hybrid setups recover up to 3.9 kWh from exhaust gases with a simple layout coupled with a Shell-and-Tube heat exchanger under constant-power control. Electricity is used to support onboard auxiliaries and battery charging, further lowering fuel demand (-44%) and emissions. Finally, a multi-objective optimization was performed to exploit the synergy between hybridization and WHR while maintaining acceptable payload and battery operating conditions.
Donateo, TeresaMorrone, Pietropaolo
The longevity of proton-exchange membrane fuel cells is governed by degradation processes whose rates depend on local operating conditions such as temperature, humidity, liquid-water saturation, and reactant availability. Along-the-channel gradients imposed by the flow field can therefore be relevant when interpreting operating behavior and when formulating models intended to support control and system studies. The AlphaPEM framework provides a dynamic through-plane description of electrochemical and water-management states, but in its baseline form does not resolve how these states vary along the gas channels. This paper presents a pseudo-2D (1+1D) extension of AlphaPEM that couples a discretized along-the-channel gas-channel model to a segment-wise MEA submodel. For each axial segment, the MEA equations are evaluated with local boundary conditions obtained from the channel (e.g., reactant and vapor concentrations), while retaining the key dynamic states of the original formulation, including cathode over-potential and membrane/catalyst-layer water variables. Electrical coupling between segments is treated explicitly. In addition to a uniform-current closure, an equipotential bipolar-plate closure is implemented, in which a common cell voltage is determined such that the sum of segment currents matches a prescribed operating point. The same structure enables frequency-domain analysis and interpretation in terms of segment-resolved apparent impedances. The contribution focuses on model formulation and coupling strategy and illustrates how axial gradients can be represented within an efficient, control-relevant PEM fuel cell model.
Ringeisen, BjörnGünthner, MichaelKargl, Pascal
The ongoing energy transition demands the decarbonization of the transport sector, for which the use of premixed hydrogen in spark-ignition (SI) engines appears very promising. However, modeling the combustion of the lean hydrogen/air mixtures required for safe, efficient, and low-NOx engine operation involves multiple open issues. Correct prediction of flame kernel initiation and growth is a difficulty that hydrogen shares with hydrocarbon fuels, while properly accounting for the instabilities that characterize lean hydrogen flames is an additional demanding task. In this work, a 1D kernel expansion model of general validity recently proposed by the authors is implemented into OpenFOAM, an open-source 3D CFD software package, to enable numerical simulation of expanding spark-ignited flame kernels. Firstly, the OpenFOAM framework is presented focusing on XiFluid, its flame propagation model based on a regress variable whose evolution depends on the laminar flame speed. Then, the authors’ kernel expansion model, based on the transient thermo-diffusive theory, is briefly recalled to highlight its capabilities and outputs. The coupling between OpenFOAM and authors’ model is split into two stages, namely ignition and expansion. During the ignition stage, an artificial profile of the regress variable is temporarily imposed to ensure a stable numerical solution, following which the kernel expansion is simulated by feeding into XiFluid an equivalent flame speed extracted from the 1D model. The coupling is currently formulated for laminar kernels, simulations of which are conducted firstly for conventional fuels (methane and propane) and then for hydrogen. The results are validated against outcomes of experimental tests performed in a constant-volume combustion chamber operated by engine manufacturer Wärtsilä. The validation is satisfactory for all fuels, although minor disagreements appear in case of intense flame stretch. These will be addressed in future developments, which will also extend this approach to unstable turbulent hydrogen flames in SI engines.
Dotteschini, EnricoPretto, MarcoGiannattasio, PietroGadalla, Mahmoud
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