Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

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Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene

Investigation into partially premixed combustion fueled with

N-butanol-diesel blends
Xiaobei Cheng*, Shuai Li, Jin Yang, Bei Liu
School of Energy and Power Engineering, Huazhong University of Sci. & Tech., Wuhan, Hubei, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Partial Premixed Compression Ignition (PPCI) in diesel engine is a combustion mode between conven-
Received 7 March 2015 tional diesel combustion and Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) combustion, which has
Received in revised form the potential to simultaneously reduce NOX and smoke emissions and also improve thermal efficiency. As
12 June 2015
a clean and renewable biofuel, n-butanol has many superior properties, such as good miscibility in diesel,
Accepted 25 August 2015
low cetane number and high volatility, which make it an attractive alternative or blending component to
Available online 12 September 2015
diesel fuel to achieve PPCI. In this paper, PPCI combustion in a four-cylinder light-duty diesel engine
fueled with n-butanolediesel blends was achieved through early or late injection condition in which the
Keywords:
Diesel
whole amount of fuel was delivered before ignition. The aim of the project was to evaluate the potential
N-butanol in realizing Partial Premixed low temperature combustion with different fuel reactivity and oxygen
Partial premixed combustion content. The exploration strategies were focused on the early or late injection timing, injection pressure
Emission and load rate to evaluate the effects of n-butanol fuel characteristics on PPCI combustion and emissions.
Efficiency The effects of injection timing and load rate on PM mass-size distribution have also been investigated.
Results show that both early and late injections have long premixed duration, which is helpful to form
more homogeneous mixtures, making a great improvement on smoke emission. With the increase of n-
butanol blending ratio, smoke emission can be reduced by up to 70%, while NOX shows a slight increase
under moderate EGR rate. When the load rate is increased, the premixed combustion fraction decreases
apparently, leading to a dramatic increase of soot mass due to the short ignition delay. It is meaningful to
find that PPCI combustion can be achieved with reasonable injection timing, lower injection pressure,
moderate EGR without penalties in fuel consumption when using high n-butanol blending ratios.
Moreover, n-butanol-diesel blends can effectively reduce the soot mass when compared with pure diesel,
but has little influence on the PM size distribution. Results indicate that n-butanol-diesel blends are more
conducive to expand PPCI operating condition and improve engine performance and emissions.
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Compression Ignition) [3,4] and PPCI (Partially Premixed

Compression Ignition) [5,6]. For HCCI combustion, the temperature
Diesel engines are widely used due to their reliability, durability is reduced by homogeneous lean combustion, realizing low smoke
and high fuel efficiency. However, its high NOX and smoke emis- and NOX engine out emissions, however, HCCI is limited by the
sions are very harmful to the environment. To meet increasingly imprecise control of ignition timing. PCCI is a new kind of com-
stringent emission regulations, researchers are keen to find various bustion mainly achieved by multi-injections to form premixed
means to decrease emissions, including developing advanced in- charges, which can also simultaneously reduce NOX and smoke
jection equipment, complex exhaust gas after treatment systems emissions. While in PPCI combustion, the total amount of fuel is
and new combustion modes, etc. In recent years, some new com- delivered before the start of combustion in order to make a better
bustion mechanisms have been investigated such as HCCI (Homo- premixing of air and fuel, resulting in a great improvement of NOX
geneous Charge Compression Ignition) [1,2], PCCI (Premixed Charge and smoke emissions. Meanwhile, it can effectively combine the
ignition timing with injection timing to make a better control of
combustion process, so it has attracted more and more researchers'
* Corresponding author.
attention.
E-mail address: [email protected] (X. Cheng). In order to realize PPCI combustion, acquiring long enough

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2015.08.067
0960-1481/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
724 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

ignition delay plays a very important role. There are many ap- to our understanding of the PPCI combustion and emission char-
proaches that can extend the ignition delay of diesel combustion, acteristics either fueled with pure diesel or gasoline/butanol-diesel
such as reducing compression ratio, using high EGR level, early or blends. The common method for achieving this is to use single or
late direct injection, and fuel modification [7,8]. D.C. Rakopoulos multi-injections and a high level of EGR rate. However, there are
et al. [9] evaluated the influence of properties of various common significant drawbacks with high EGR rates like lower combustion
bio-fuels on the combustion, performance and exhaust emissions efficiency and higher CO and HC emissions [16]. In addition, high
of a single-cylinder, high-speed diesel engine. Results showed that EGR rates can affect smoke oxidation late in the cycle [17]. While
the ignition delay is slightly decreased for the vegetable oil or its fewer studies are given on the method of early or late injections and
bio-diesel diesel fuel blends, and slightly increased for the two al- a moderate level of EGR rate to achieve PPCI combustion with n-
cohols (ethanol, n-butanol) most notably for the diethyl ether butanol-diesel blends. The effects of n-butanol-diesel fuel proper-
blends. With increasing percentage of all bio-fuels in the blends, ties (such as fuel reactivity, cetane number and oxygen content) on
significant reduction of smoke opacity is observed with the the single early or late injection PPCI combustion heat release and
exception of the vegetable oil case. Manente et al. [10,11] developed emission characteristics are not very clear. So it's of great signifi-
a gasoline PPC strategy running a variety of gasoline fuels with very cance to make investigations on this field.
different octane number in a heavy duty engine. It was suggested In our previous work, we have studied the PPCI combustion and
that the optimum EGR fraction and l for PPC are about 50% and 1.5 emission characteristics in a heavy duty diesel engine fueled with
respectively. In lean PPC mode, with good combination of l and pure diesel through early or late injection. Results show that both
EGR ratio, some fuels were able to comply with both EU VI and early and late injection have long mixing period, which is helpful to
US10 emission requirements on smoke and NOX in certain load form more homogeneous mixture. Smoke and NOX emissions can
regions. Kalghatgi et al. [12] have studied the effects of gasoline-like be simultaneously reduced for premixed and low temperature
fuels on partially premixed diesel combustion realized in two single combustion. In this paper, PPCI combustion in a four-cylinder light-
cylinder research engines. They observed that if gasoline is injected duty diesel engine fueled with n-butanolediesel blends was ach-
close to TDC, it ignites much later than diesel fuel. As a result ieved through early or late injection. The aim of the project was to
combustion occurs when fuel and air have reached a better mixing. evaluate the potential in realizing Partial Premixed low tempera-
For a given condition, the enhanced mixing rate produces a sig- ture combustion with different fuel reactivity and oxygen content,
nificant reduction of smoke while NOx reduction may be obtained to reduce emissions without significant penalty on engine perfor-
by moderate EGR rates. mance. The exploration strategies were focused on the early or late
Recently, butanol has drawn considerable research attention as injection timing, injection pressure and load rate to achieve a
an alternative fuel for diesel engines due to its unique properties. condition in which the whole amount of fuel was delivered before
Compared with methanol and ethanol, butanol has a higher ignition.
miscibility, releases more energy per unit mass and possesses lower
vapor pressure. Besides, the lubricity is also better compared to
2. Experimental apparatus and test conditions
ethanol, more suitable for the common rail fuel injection system.
Further, butanol has a lower auto-ignition temperature and a
The engine used for this study is a turbocharged, 4-cylinder light
higher cetane number than ethanol and methanol, so it can be
duty diesel engine, engine specifications are listed in Table 1, and a
ignited easier when used in diesel engines. Hence, butanol is
general sketch of the experimental setup is shown in Fig. 1. The
thought to be a more appropriate blend component with diesel
injection system and main engine parameters were controlled by
fuel, especially in achieving partially premixed combustion.
the ECU and parameters such as injection pressure, interval and
Since butanol has several isomers (n-, iso-, 2-, and tert-butanol),
timing were set by PC using the INCA software. The cylinder
the combustion chemistry of butanol isomers has been an area of
pressure was measured by the sensor Kistler 6125C. At each oper-
intense research activity in the recent years. S. Mani Sarathy et al.
ating point, 100 cylinder pressure cycles were collected with in-
[13] made a summary of research on alcohol combustion chemistry.
terval of 0.1
CA, then averaged and smoothed.
They studied the ignition of n-, iso-, 2-, and tert-butanol at high
in order to be used for combustion analysis. A charge amplifier
temperatures (i.e., above 1000 K) and pressures ranging from
(Kistler 5018A1003) was connected with the pressure transducer to
approximately 1e50 bar (4% fuel in Ar/O2 mixtures). Both experi-
achieve charge-to-voltage conversion. The Top Dead Center (TDC)
mental data and simulation results showed that n-butanol is the
crank angle position was measured by an Optical Encoder. In the
most reactive, followed by 2-butanol, with iso-butanol exhibiting
experiment, hydrogen flame ionization detector (HFID), nondis-
similar reactivity, while tert-butanol is much less reactive. And
persive infrared analyzer (NDIR), chemiluminescent detector (CLD)
industrialists have targeted n-butanol as an alternative fuel for
were used to measure the HC, CO and NOX emissions respectively.
deployment in the foreseeable future. C.A.J. Leermakers et al. [14]
Smoke was measured by an AVL Di-smoke 4000. Table 2 shows the
have achieved PPCI combustion by using high n-butanol blending
accuracy of the measurements and uncertainty of computed
rations and high EGR rate. Results showed that moderate n-
parameters.
butanol-diesel blend is a viable approach to partially premixed
Besides, the PM mass-size distribution was studied by using a
combustion. All such n-butanol-diesel blends have shown an
extremely high smoke reduction potential compared to diesel-only,
even at moderate fuel pressures. Gerardo Valentino [15] reported Table 1
an experimental investigation in a modern diesel engine running at Specification of engine.
different operative conditions and fueled with blends of diesel and
4 Cylinder, 4Valve, DI diesel engine
n-butanol. The adopted strategy was focused on injection pressure
Bore(mm) 110
and start of injection management to achieve a condition in which
Stroke(mm) 125
the whole amount of fuel was injected earlier than the start of Compression ratio 17.5
combustion. A low level of smoke and NOx emissions were reached Displacement Volume(L) 4.75
in the investigation due to the longer ignition delay and a better Fuel injection system Common-rail
mixing control before combustion. Injection pressure (MPa) 80e160
Injection nozzle specification 8/0.16/150

As discussed above, previous researches have contributed a lot
 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732 725

Fig. 1. Sketch of experimental engine setup.

Table 2 calculated by the following equations proposed by Zoldy et al. [18].

Accuracy of measurements and uncertainty of computed parameters.

Measurements Accuracy
Vblend ¼ 0:0346Xb þ Vd (1)
Smoke opacity ±0.1%
NOx ±10 ppm CNblend ¼ 0:4908Xb þ CNd (2)
Speed ±5 rpm
Torque ±1 N m Where Vblend and Vd refer to the kinetic viscosity of a blended fuel
Computed parameters Uncertainty (%) and that of the diesel fuel, CNblend and CNd refer to the cetane
Fuel volumetric rate ±1 number of the blended fuel and that of the diesel fuel, respectively.
Power ±1 Xb (%) is the volumetric ratio of n-butanol in the blended fuel.
Power Specific fuel consumption ±1.5
Lower heating value was calculated from
Efficiency ±1.5

rB  b  LHVB þ rD  ð100  bÞ  LHVD

LHVBD ¼ (3)
rB  b þ rD  ð100  bÞ
low pressure impactor (LPI). The operating principle of the LPI is
based on particle charging, inertial classification in a cascade Where LHVBD (kJ/kg) is the correct lower heating value based on the
impactor and electrical detection of the aerosol particles. It has 13 butanol percentageb; LHVB is the lower heating value of butanol(kJ/
stages, which classify the particles according to their aerodynamic kg); LHVD is the lower heating value of diesel (kJ/kg),rB is the
diameter. With a filter stage, it can measure the particle size density of butanol (kg/m3) andrD is the density of diesel (kg/m3).
ranging from 7 nm to 10 mm. Each stage has a cut diameter, which is As we can see, the main differences between diesel and blends
defined as the diameter of the particle collected with an efficiency are related to the cetane index, lower heating value, density, vis-
of 50%. cosity, which for the blends results to be a little lower, while the
oxygen content, volatility,H/C ratio of the blends are a little higher.
2.1. Fuel characteristics
2.2. Operating conditions
Three different fuels were used in the test: commercially avail-
able 0# diesel oil (B00), two n-butanol-diesel blends. The blending This experiment mainly studied the effects of n-butanol-diesel
ratios are 9:1 and 7:3 (diesel: n-butanol) by volume denoted as B10 blends, start of injection, injection pressure and load rate on com-
and B30 respectively. Main characteristics of diesel (B00), B10, B30 bustion and emission performance. The engine speed was set at
and n-butanol (B100) can be found in Table 3. Some parameters like 1500r/min, and three load rates (low, medium and high) were
oxygen content, density were simply estimated as mass fraction chosen, the brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) were 0.43 MPa,
weighted sums of the corresponding values of diesel fuel and n- 0.86 MPa and 1.12 MPa respectively. As discussed before that high
butanol. The cetane number and kinematic viscosity values were EGR rate can bring a lot of drawbacks on the BSFC and HC emission,
726 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

Table 3
Main characteristics of B00, B10, B30 and B100.

Fuel properties B00 [19] B100 [20] B10 B30

Lower heating value (MJ/kg) 42.5 33.12 41.6 39.80

Oxygen content (%) 0 21.62 2.42 6.53
H/C 1.86 2.5 1.91 2.02
Cetane Number 50 ~25 45.1 35.3
Latent heat of vaporization (kJ/kg) 270 591.2 300 362.1
Density(20
C) (g/cm3) 0.85 0.81 0.84 0.83
Kinematic viscosity at 20
C (mm2/s) 4.82 3.64 2.69 2.42
Boiling point (
C) 180e370 117.7 e e

so in this experiment we choose a moderate EGR rate about 26% and diesel respectively, bBSFC、bEBSFC represent measured fuel
(intake oxygen concentration 17.6%), which could keep a better consumption and the equivalent fuel consumption respectively.
balance on the emissions and BSFC, also is close to the practical use
in heavy duty diesel engines. In order to reduce the influence of
other factors, cooling water temperature, inlet air temperature and 3. Results and discussion
pressure were kept constant as far as possible. The reference fuel
was tested three times along this study, in order to evaluate the 3.1. Effects of blending ratio on combustion and emissions
repeatability of experiments and to watch over any possible drift of
the results. In the whole experiments, the maximum COV of IMEP Fig. 2 shows the cylinder pressure and heat release rate (HRR) at
was 3%. The details of the operating ranges explored in this study different SOI for various fuel blends. For all fuel blends, the peak
are summarized in Table 4. cylinder pressure declines with retarded SOI. While the premixed
peak HRR decreases at first, then showing an increasing trend. This
2.3. Parameters computed can be attributed to the short ignition delay at conventional in-
jection timing, the chemical reaction rate is depended on the
In this study, the cylinder gas pressure data was analyzed using mixing rate, so the premixed peak HRR is very low. However, with
single-zone thermodynamic model. Based on the cylinder pressure, the injection timing advances or postpones, the ignition delay
the apparent heat release can be calculated as following by the first generally increases, as shown in Fig. 3. It is extended from 9
CA
thermodynamic law assuming equilibrium during combustion: under conventional injection (8
CA ATDC) to 16
CA under early
(33
CA ATDC) or late injection (5
CA ATDC), thus forming more
dQ g dV 1 dp dQw homogenous and leaner mixtures. Correspondingly, the premixed
¼ p þ V þ (4)
d4 g  1 d4 g  1 d4 d4 combustion begins to take the leading role and nearly no diffusion
combustion happens. Premixed combustion is a kinetically-
Where g is the ratio of specific heats which was taken depending controlled combustion which is very fast and has a short duration
upon cylinder temperature,4 is crank angle, p is cylinder gas time, leading to a high peak HRR and pressure rise rate.
pressure, V is cylinder volume, QW is heat transfer from the cylinder At the same injection timing, the peak HRR ascends with an
wall. Woschni correlation [21] was used to calculate the QW. increase in n-butanol percentage, however, the combustion phase
In heat release curve, the calculated crank angle at which 10% of was delayed. In early injection, it appears almost full premixed
the fuel has been burnt as main indicator for the start of combus- combustion with the injection timing of 18
CA ATDC for B30,
tion (SOC). The ignition delay was estimated as the crank angle while for B00 and B10, the SOI should be earlier about 28
CA
interval between the SOI and SOC, as computed from the rate of ATDC. When it comes to late injection, fully premixed combustion
heat release (ROHR). And premixed combustion duration was can be achieved when the injection timing is retarded to 2
CA
evaluated as the crank angle interval between SOC and the valley ATDC for B30, while for B00 and B10, the SOI should be later about
(lower inflection point of curve) that between two peaks of the heat
release rate curve. EGR rate was calculated by the concentration of
CO2 in intake gas and exhaust gas through the following equation:

EGRð%Þ ¼ ðCO2 %Þintake ðCO2 %Þexhaust  100 (5)

In addition, equivalent fuel consumption was calculated by the

following formula:

bEBSFC ¼ bBSFC  HL =HLd (6)

HL、HLd are the lower heating value of n-butanol-diesel blends

Table 4
Summary of engine operating conditions.

BMEP(MPa) 0.43/0.86/1.12
Engine speed(rpm) 1500
Injection pressure(MPa) 100/120/140
Start of injection(ATDC) 33 to 5
EGR(%) 26
Cooling water temperature(
C) 80 ± 2
Fig. 2. Cylinder pressure and HRR for various fuel blends at different SOI
Lube oil temperature(
C) 90 to 110
(1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa, Pinj ¼ 100 MPa).
 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732 727

smoke emission reaches its largest value for all blending ratios due
to the short ignition delay (shown in Fig. 3). But for early and late
injection, longer ignition delay can be achieved to form more ho-
mogenous mixtures, largely declining smoke emission. However,
when the SOI is advanced before 28 ºCA ATDC, the spray pene-
tration of the injection is not limited so that part of the injected fuel
impinges on the piston head surface or cylinder wall. Then large
amount of rich mixtures (high equivalence ratio) are formed
through evaporation in the space region closed to the wet wall,
which is conducive to generate smoke emission under the action of
high temperature combustion gas. As a result, smoke emission in-
creases. Besides, smoke emission is noticeably reduced for all in-
jection timings as blending ratio increases. It declines by nearly 70%
for B30 compared with B00, which can be attributed to the low
cetane number and higher volatility of n-butanol, making a better
mixture to realize full-premixed combustion. Meanwhile, the ox-
ygen contained in n-butanol and high H/C ratio of n-butanol can be
Fig. 3. Ignition delay and peak pressure rise rate for various fuel blends at different SOI of great improvement in local equivalence ratio, restraining the
(1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa, Pinj ¼ 100 MPa). formation of soot. However, an increasing phenomenon of smoke
emission of B30 happens with the excessive retardation of injection
timing (5
CA ATDC). It can be explained that the combustion phase
5
CA ATDC. However, there is a sharp decline of heat release rate is over delayed, and cylinder temperature decreases, lowering the
and peak pressure rise rate for B30 with the latest injection timing oxidation rate of soot emission.
(5
CA ATDC). While for NOX emission we can see that it rises slightly as
The phenomena above are mainly related to the physicochem- blending ratio increases. Firstly, the latent heat of evaporation of n-
ical property of n-butanol and EGR peculiarity. Firstly, n-butanol butanol is higher than diesel, so the NOx emission is decreased due
has low cetane number and high volatility, which can prolong the to the evaporative cooling. On the other hand, the oxygenated fuel
ignition delay and enhance the air/fuel mixing to form more ho- components increased the combustion efficiency, and the pre-
mogeneous mixtures. As shown in Fig. 3, the ignition delay can be mixed combustion became more intensive, causing an increase of
prolonged 2
CA by B30 when compared with pure diesel. So it is NOx emission. In addition, the NOX emission increases distinctly as
conducive to achieve full premixed combustion with B30. However, the injection timing is advanced. So in early injection higher EGR
the excessively long ignition delay brought by EGR, B30 and the ratio is still needed to restrain NOx formation. Rouselle [22] etc.,
latest injection timing would put off the combustion phase, Chen [23] etc. have studied that high EGR rate is an effective means
resulting in a quick drop of cylinder temperature. At this time, to form homogeneous and lean mixtures to suppress NOx forma-
expansion loss and heat loss increase significantly, the peak HRR tion. However, in late injection, the temperature is relatively low
decreases because of the low combustion efficiency and long and high temperature lasts only for a short time, high oxygen
combustion duration. On the other side, n-butanol has lower content in fuel alone cannot promote NOX formation. So the impact
heating value and high latent heat of vaporization. This means that of blending ratio on NOX emission is reduced.
more fuel needs to be injected into the cylinder under the same As shown in Fig. 4(b), when the SOI is before TDC, HC and CO
load condition, thus more heat will be absorbed during its vapor- emissions are very low. This can be attributed to the high cylinder
ization. In this case, the cylinder temperature decreases, resulting temperature and oxygen contained in n-butanol, which can pro-
in a slight decline of peak cylinder pressure. mote the oxidation of HC and CO. In late injection, however, HC and
Fig. 4(a) presents the smoke and NOx emissions for different CO emissions rise sharply. Under this condition, ignition delay be-
injection timings. In conventional injection timing (3
CA ATDC), comes longer due to the low cylinder temperature and n-butanol

Fig. 4. Emissions as a function of SOI for various fuel blends. (1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa, Pinj ¼ 100 MPa).
728 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

blends, which can broaden the lean spray flame-out region caused increase of injection pressure only has little impact on the start of
by the existence of the fuel-bound oxygen. This is the region in combustion for B00. Though it can shorten the ignition delay and
which the fuel has already mixed beyond the lean limit of com- combustion duration, the effect on premixed charge is not obvious.
bustion, without then being able to auto-ignite and sustain a fast However, when it comes to B30, the increased injection pressure
reaction front [9]. Then more CO emission is produced because of can apparently advance the start of combustion since B30 is more
the incomplete oxidation during the expansion stroke [24]. sensitive to the variation of injection pressure due to its low vis-
Fig. 5 shows the brake thermal efficiency, BSFC and equivalent cosity and density of n-butanol. Higher injection pressure leads to
BSFC as a function of SOI for various fuel blends. The lowest BSFC smaller fuel drops, which can shorten the evaporation time to
happens when the SOI is close to 13
CA ATDC. However, when advance the start of combustion.
the SOI is advanced or retarded, brake thermal efficiency declines, Fig. 7 illustrates the emission characteristics for B00 and B30
correspondingly BSFC increases. There are two reasons for this. at different injection pressure. When the injection timing is
Firstly, in early injection, oxidation reaction process before com- before 13
CAATDC, NOX emission goes up slightly as
bustion releases a large amount of heat, raising the cylinder tem- injection pressure increases. However, as SOI is advanced close
perature that can cause more negative work to piston and heat loss to 33
CAATDC, the influence of the injection pressure on NOX
to the cold cylinder wall. While in late injection, the temperature is emission becomes tiny. At this condition, more homogenous and
low resulting in more incomplete combustion, expansion loss is leaner mixtures are formed due to the long ignition delay, the
enlarged. Secondly, both early and late injection make combustion cylinder temperature decreases, restraining the NOX formation.
phase deviate from the TDC, lowering the efficiency. As the While NOX emission is independent of injection pressure, staying at
blending ratio increases, the lower heating value of the fuels re- a low level when the injection timing is after 13
CAATDC.
duces, leading to a high BSFC. However, as blending ratio gets In conventional injection timing (13
CA ~ 3
CA ATDC),
larger, premixed combustion fractions increase due to the high increasing injection pressure can largely reduce smoke emission for
volatility and low cetane number of n-butanol, improving com- B00. When injection pressure is raised from 100 MPa to 140 MPa,
bustion phase and efficiency. It is clear to see that equivalent BSFC smoke emission can be reduced by 60%. For early or late injection,
drops off with n-butanol blends. One exception exists when in- smoke emission can stay low even under lower injection pressure.
jection timing is retarded to 5
CA ATDC. B30 leads to an excessive Generally, injection pressure has little effect on smoke emission for
long ignition delay that combustion phase is too far from TDC to B30, a low level of smoke emission can be kept at all injection
maintain high efficiency. timings for B30. This can be attributed to the high volatility, low
In conclusion, butanol percentage and fuel injection timing are cetane number and oxygen-contained properties of n-butanol,
important parameters to control the process of ignition and heat which are beneficial to from a homogenous mixture and promote
release in PPCI combustion mode. Reasonable optimization of these soot oxidation, thus weakening the effect of injection pressure. The
parameters can improve PPCI combustion and simultaneously effect of injection pressure on CO emission is similar to that of
reduce NOX and smoke emissions without much penalty in fuel smoke emission. However, when the injection timing is advanced
consumption. before 28
CA ATDC, high injection pressure induces a long spray
penetration, intensifying wall-wetting phenomenon. Thus CO in
3.2. Effects of injection pressure some low temperature regions cannot get enough oxidation,
leading to a higher CO emission.
The increase of injection pressure can improve atomization and In Fig. 8, an obvious decline in brake thermal efficiency can be
evaporation, further promoting the premixed process before found as injection pressure increases when injection timing is
combustion. As presented in Fig. 6, with the injection pressure in- advanced before 18
CA ATDC and the BSFC increases corre-
creases, the peak heat release rate increases slightly at different spondingly. Firstly, high injection pressure can further enhance the
injection timings for B00 and B30. Meanwhile, premixed combus- air/fuel mixing to improve the oxidation reaction rate, more heat
tion takes a larger proportion, promoting the combustion rate, thus will be released during this process, thus causing more negative
leading to a higher peak cylinder pressure. In early injection, work on piston. On the other hand, increasing injection pressure
increased the fuel pump's work load. However, when injection
timing is after 13
CA ATDC, the brake thermal efficiency of B00
and B30 shows a different trend as injection pressure increases. The
brake thermal efficiency of B00 stays unchanged while that of B30
increases, which can be attributed to the improvement of com-
bustion phase for B30 with higher injection pressure.
So in early injection, BSFC cannot be improved just by increasing
injection pressure alone. There exists a turning point for the in-
fluence of injection pressure on efficiency. But for late injection,
combustion phase can be controlled by injection pressure for B30 to
improve thermal efficiency and reduce NOX, smoke and BSFC
simultaneously.

3.3. Effects of load rate

Fig. 9 shows heat release patterns for B00 and B30 at different
load rates. It can be seen that PPCI combustion can be realized both
for B00 and B30 through early or late injection timing at low load
rate (BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa). With the increase of load rate, the cylinder
temperature rises, which is helpful to form flame cores in mixing
Fig. 5. Brake thermal efficiency, BSFC and equivalent BSFC as a function of SOI for zones that is close to Stoichiometric Ratio. So the premixed com-
various fuel blends (1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa, Pinj ¼ 100 MPa). bustion fractions decrease as the ignition delay is limited. While the
 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732 729

Fig. 6. Cylinder pressure and heat release rate for B00 and B30 at different injection pressure (1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.86 MPa).

Fig. 7. Emissions for B00 and B30 at different injection pressure (1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.86 MPa).

Fig. 8. Brake thermal efficiency, BSFC for B00 and B30 at different injection pressure (1500 rpm@BMEP ¼ 0.86 MPa).

diffusion combustion plays a dominant role in the combustion with indicates that n-butanol-diesel blends is more suitable for PPCI
high heat release peak and long duration. At high load rate, PPCI mode.
combustion already cannot be achieved by advancing or retarding As the BMEP increases from 0.43 MPa to 1.12 MPa, the ignition
injection timing. However, the premixed combustion fractions in delay is reduced about 3
CA~5
CA both for B00 and B30, as shown
the combustion of B30 are still much higher than B00, which in Fig. 10. Moreover, the injection amount increases a lot at high
730 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

Fig. 12. Brake thermal efficiency, Equivalent BSFC for B00 and B30 at different load
rates (1500 rpm, Pinj ¼ 120 MPa).
Fig. 9. Heat release rate for B00 and B30 at different load rates (1500 rpm,
Pinj ¼ 120 MPa).
operating conditions at a low EGR rate, thus avoiding producing
more HC, CO emissions and fuel consumption brought by high EGR
rate [25,26].
Fig. 11 illustrates the effects of load rates on NOX, PM and CO
emissions of B00 and B30. We can find that NOX emission goes up
apparently as the load rate increases, which can be attributed to the
high temperature caused by more diffusion combustion. Compared
with B00, smoke emissions can be significantly reduced, reaching
almost zero emission under all injection timings by using B30 at
low load rate. However, the impact on smoke emission decreases at
high load rate since the temperature plays a more significant role
on ignition delay in this condition, so the effect of n-butanol
characteristics is weakened. Besides, it is meaningful to find that
smoke emissions can get improved at all load rates both through
early and late injection. Generally, load rates only have little in-
fluence on CO emission, but one phenomenon should be pointed
out is that for late injection PPCI with injection timings of 0～5ºCA
ATDC, the CO emission rises sharply. It mainly results from
incomplete combustion of local quenching and misfire in the
expansion stroke.
Fig. 10. Ignition delay for B00 and B30 at different load rates (1500 rpm, As is shown in Fig. 12, higher brake thermal efficiency could be
Pinj ¼ 120 MPa). gained when the load rate increases for B00 and B30 due to the
reduction of heat loss, correspondingly lower equivalent BSFC.
load rate, which cannot be fully premixed in a short mixing time. Moreover, brake thermal efficiency goes up by using appropriate n-
But there still exist about 15
CA ignition delay of B30 even at butanol ratio, but this trend becomes unobvious at high load rate,
medium load rate. This indicates that adding fuels with low cetane as explained before that the function of n-butanol fuel character-
number and high volatility to pure diesel could expand PPCI istics is weakened in this condition.

Fig. 11. Emissions for B00 and B30 at different load rates (1500 rpm, Pinj ¼ 120 MPa).
 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732 731

Fig. 13. PM mass-size distribution under different injection timing (1500 rpm, BMEP ¼ 0.43 MPa, Pinj ¼ 100 MPa).

4. PM mass-size distribution n-butanol enhances the air/fuel mixing to inhabit the formation of
PM. Secondly, adding n-butanol reduces the sulfur content of the
Fig. 13(a) shows the effects of injection timing on PM mass-size fuel, which decreases the PM emission. Moreover, as an oxygenated
distribution. It can be seen that under all injection timings, the fuel, n-butanol has a lower tendency to form soot precursors, such
diameter of PM is mostly below 1 mm. Both early and late injection as benzene and poly cyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) [27,28].
can reduce the particulate mass and shift the peak mass size to the From Fig. 14(b), we can see that the mass of PM can be reduced by
smaller side. This can be attributed to the variation of ignition delay 45% at low load rate by using B30 when compared with pure diesel.
which has great effect on particulate forming and oxidation pro- Even at high load rate, it still has the potential to decrease 24% of
cess. Early and late injections can extend the ignition delay to from the soot mass. All the findings above show that adding fuels with
more homogeneous mixtures, thus inhabiting the precursor of low cetane number and high volatility characteristics is also an
particulate and increasing the oxidation rate. The total mass of PM effective way to reduce PM apart from adjusting SOI.
can be reduced by 51%(13
CA ATDC), 60% (23
CA ATDC), 24%
(2
CA ATDC) respectively, when compared with conventional in- 5. Conclusions
jection timing, as can be seen from Fig. 13(b). For late injection, HC
emission increases, promoting the forming of SOF (soluble organic In this paper, PPCI combustion in a four-cylinder light-duty
fraction), so the particulate mass is higher than early injection, diesel engine fueled with n-butanolediesel blends is achieved
which is corresponding with the trend of HC concentration in Fig. 4. through early or late injection condition. The effects of n-buta-
Fig. 14 presents the mass-size distribution of PM emission of B00 nolediesel blends, start of injection, injection pressure and load
and B30 under different load rates. The increase of the engine load rate on PPCI combustion and emissions have been investigated. The
results in larger peak mass of PM and also shifts the peak mass size main results may be summarized in the following points:
to the larger side both for B00 and B30. It can be explained that the
ignition delay becomes short, while the injection amount increases 1. Both early and late injection have long premixed duration,
a lot under high load rate, which is not conducive to form premixed which is helpful to form more homogeneous mixtures before
mixtures. So the local equivalence ratio increases, leading to larger the start of combustion. In this way, smoke emission can get
size and mass of PM. Besides, n-butanol-diesel blends can effec- great improvement, while for early injection higher EGR ratio is
tively reduce the mass of PM, but has little influence on the peak still needed to restrain NOx formation. Besides, by using n-
mass size. Firstly, the low cetane number and high volatility of butanolediesel blends, PPCI combustion can be achieved with

Fig. 14. PM mass-size distribution under different load rates (1500 rpm,SOI ¼ 3
CA ATDC, Pinj ¼ 120 MPa).
732 X. Cheng et al. / Renewable Energy 86 (2016) 723e732

lower injection pressure and moderate EGR rate, which is butanol-diesel fuel blends on the performance and emissions of a high-speed
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