Applied Thermal Engineering 26 (2006) 277287 www.elsevier.

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Thermal analysis of an SI engine piston using dierent combustion boundary condition treatments
V. Esfahanian a, A. Javaheri a, M. Ghaarpour
a b

b,*

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Tehran, North Amir-Abad Ave., Tehran, Iran University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Mechanical Engineering, 842 Taylor Street 2039 ERF (MC 251), Chicago, IL 60607, United States Received 17 August 2004; accepted 4 May 2005 Available online 29 September 2005

Abstract In this study, the heat transfer to an engine piston crown is calculated. Three dierent methods for the combustion boundary condition are used. The results of dierent combustion side boundary condition treatments are compared and their eects on the thermal behavior of the piston are investigated. It has been shown that using spatial and time averaged combustion side boundary condition is a suitable treatment method within engineering approximations. An interface between KIVA-3V and NASTRAN codes is developed. 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Piston; Heat transfer; Combustion; Boundary Condition Treatment

1. Introduction It is important to calculate the piston temperature distribution in order to control the thermal stresses and deformations within acceptable levels. The temperature distribution enables us to optimize the thermal aspects of the piston design at lower cost, before the rst prototype is constructed. As much as 60% of the total engine mechanical power lost is generated by piston ring assembly [1]. The piston skirt surface slides on the cylinder bore. A lubricant lm lls the clearance between the surfaces. The small values of the clearance increase the frictional losses and the high values increase the secondary motion of the piston. Most of the Internal Combustion (IC) engine pistons are made of an aluminum alloy which has a thermal expansion coecient, 80% higher than the cylinder bore material made of cast iron. This leads to some dierences between running and the
*

Corresponding author. E-mail address: mghaar@uic.edu (M. Ghaarpour).

design clearances. Therefore, analysis of the piston thermal behavior is extremely crucial in designing more ecient engine. The thermal analysis of piston is important from different perspectives. First, the highest temperature of any point in piston must not exceed more than 66% of the melting point temperature of the alloy [2]. This limit temperature for the current engine piston alloy is about 640 K. Temperature distribution leads to thermal deformations and thermal stresses. The piston thermal deformation has an important role in piston skirt design which has a potential to reduce friction and piston slap. In this design, both of the thermal and mechanical stresses must be considered indicating the importance of piston thermal analysis. In the recent work [1], Li used nite element method to analyze the piston thermal behavior. Because of symmetry, he only used a quarter of the piston. He applied the thermal boundary conditions of piston symmetrically. He used simple combustion model for combustion side boundary condition. His numerical results matched

1359-4311/$ - see front matter 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2005.05.002

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Nomenclature As h1 h2 h3 h4 he hi hup hdown hwater huc1 huc2 H1 H2 H3 k K Kgas N Prl q00 q00 i q00 i eective area in contact with coolant (m2) convective heat transfer coecient in waterjacket of cylinder 1 (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient in waterjacket of cylinder 2 (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient in waterjacket of cylinder 3 (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient in waterjacket of cylinder 4 (kW/m2 K) eective convective heat transfer coecient on the piston (kW/m2 K) nodal convective heat transfer coecient on the piston top surface (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient on the upper side of the ring gap (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient on the lower side of the ring gap (kW/m2 K) convective heat transfer coecient in waterjacket (kW/m2 K) crown underside convective heat transfer coecient (kW/m2 K) skirt underside convective heat transfer coefcient (kW/m2 K) width of the heat transfer path in ring (m) width of the heat transfer path in oil lm (m) width of the heat transfer path in block (m) Karman constant kinetic energy (m2/s2) conductive heat transfer coecient of the in-cylinder gas (kW/K) engine speed (rpm) laminar Prandtl number heat ux on the piston top surface (kW/m2) nodal surface heat ux on the piston top surface (kW/m2) nodal cycle averaged surface heat ux on the piston top surface (kW/m2) r1 r2 r3 r4 R1 R2 R3 R4 Rtot RPR Ti Ti Toil T p i T new p T old p Tpiston Tw Twall Twater T Y inner radius of the ring (m) outer radius of the ring (m) bore radius (m) inner radius of the water-jacket (m) ring conductive thermal resistance (m2 K/ kW) oil lm conductive thermal resistance (m2 K/ kW) block conductive thermal resistance (m2 K/ kW) water-jacket convective thermal resistance (m2 K/kW) sum of the thermal resistance values (m2 K/ kW) the inverse turbulent Prandtl number nodal gas temperature on the piston top surface (K) nodal cycle averaged gas temperature on the piston top surface (K) oil temperature (K) nodal piston top surface temperature (K) new calculated temperature of the piston top surface (K) old calculated temperature of the piston top surface (K) piston temperature (K) wall temperature (K) wall temperature (K) coolant temperature in the water-jacket (K) gas temperature (K) distance from the wall (K)

Greek symbols d the crevice clearance (m) q the gas density (kg/m3) ml kinematic viscosity (m2/s)

with experiment well. Abbas et al. [5] developed a threedimensional nite element full analysis which describes the thermo-mechanical behavior of direct injection diesel engine piston. The piston was subjected to the coupled action of thermal and mechanical loads. The results would be used as source data for the development of a global elastohydrodynamic model and was provided a good tool for piston design analysis. Liu and Reitz [3,4] developed a two-dimensional (axisymmetric) transient heat conduction in components (HCC) computer program for predicting combustion chamber wall temperatures. Their results were compared with a nite element method and veried for sim-

plied test problems. In addition, their model was applied to realistic problems and gave a good agreement with available experimental data. Jenkin et al. [6] modied an existing quasi-dimensional engine cycle model to enable accurate prediction of near wall temperature eld in the burned and unburned gases. A ke turbulence model had been incorporated into the engine cycle simulation. Bohac et al. [7] used a resistant-capacitor model to analyze the piston heat transfer. In their model, some points in piston are assumed as capacitor and the paths between them are treated as resistances. This model is usually used for engine components including piston warm-up process analysis.

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Heat is transferred from the hot gases to the piston top surface, and then conducted to the other side of the piston. Then the heat is transferred to the other parts of the engine from other sides of piston such as ring land, skirt, under side and pin. In the present work, the thermal boundary conditions for the piston thermal analysis are developed. The interaction between the combustion side boundary condition is investigated.

dimensional heat conduction equation for the nite element models. The three-dimensional piston solid model is meshed in PATRAN software (Fig. 2) and imported into NASTRAN. The mesh has 96,120 10node tetrahedral elements (tet10) and 145,844 nodes. KIVA-3V, which is an IC engine in-cylinder ow and combustion analyzer CFD code, is used for combustion analysis. The code integrates the transient, conservation of mass, momentum, energy and species equation

2. Numerical approach Fig. 1 shows the solid model of the piston under study. This model is generated by SolidWorks. The characteristics of the engine under study are summarized in Table 1. A commercial nite element package, NASTRAN, is used for thermal analysis. NASTRAN solves the three-

Fig. 2. Piston mesh generated in PATRAN for use in NASTRAN.

Fig. 1. Piston solid model generated by SolidWorks.

Table 1 Specication of the engine under study Bore Stroke Compression ratio Connecting rod IVO IVC EVO IP IT k RPM Ignition time 8.735 cm 6.667 cm 8 11.61 cm 44 bTDC 84 aBDC 46 bBDC 0.83 bar 297 K 1.1 5000 55 bTDC

Fig. 3. Combustion chamber mesh generated in KIVA-3V.

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Fig. 4. Piston top surface meshes in KIVA-3V and NASTRAN.

governing the ensemble averaged behavior of chemically reacting turbulent ow. The standard two-equation ke turbulent model is used. The mathematical form of the governing equations is provided in detail in the KIVA users manual. In the original code, combustion is modeled using either nite-rate laminar, chemistry or chemical equilibrium. KIVA integrates nite-dierence approximations to the governing equations. Temporal and spatial dierencing is achieved using a semi-implicit, quasi-second-order up-winding approach together with the arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) technique to treat grid movement associated with the piston motion. See reference [10] for details. Fig. 3 shows the mesh generated for KIVA-3V. this mesh has 73,299 cells and 73,320 nodes. The above selected grid size and number was selected based on recommendation by engine manufacturer. An extensive computational study to optimize the grid size and number was performed by engine manufacturer. The 4-node interpolation method is used for data transferring (like q00 , T, . . .) between the meshes of piston top surface in NASTRAN and KIVA-3V. Fig. 4 illustrates these two meshes.

Fig. 5. Thermal circuit resistance model for heat transfer from the rings.

the eect of piston motion on the heat transfer is neglected; the rings and skirt are fully engulfed in oil and there are no cavitations; the rings do not twist; the only heat transfer mode in the oil lm is assumed to be conduction. The resistances are: R1 R2 R3 lnr2 =r1 2pH 1 k ring lnr3 =r2 2pH 2 k oil ring resistance oil film resistance 1 2 3 4

3. Piston thermal boundary conditions Piston thermal boundary conditions consist of: 1. 2. 3. 4. the ring land and skirt thermal boundary condition; underside thermal boundary condition; piston pin thermal boundary condition; combustion side thermal boundary condition.

lnr4 =r3 block resistance 2pH 3 k block 1 R4 water-jacket resistance hwater As

3.1. The ring land and skirt thermal boundary condition Thermal circuit method is used to model the heat transfer in the ring land and skirt region (Fig. 5) with the following assumptions:

where r1, . . . ,r4 are inner radius of ring, outer radius of ring, bore radius and inner radius of water-jacket, respectively. H1, H2 and H3 are the widths of the heat transfer paths, respectively. As is the eective area in contact with the coolant. The oil lm layer resistance is small in comparison with the other resistances (Table 2). Thus the variation in the oil lm thickness and the eect of piston motion in convective heat transfer on the oil lm is negligible. Formation of cavitations in oil lm region where the heat ux approaches zero is also a problem. In those

V. Esfahanian et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 26 (2006) 277287 Table 2 Thermal resistance values for rst ring thermal circuit at 5000 RPM Resistances (m2 K/kW) R1 R2 R3 R4 Rtot 0.151 7 105 0.023 0.159 0.333

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Table 3 Coolant side convective heat transfer coecients for cylinders 14 Heat transfer coecient h1 h2 h3 h4 W/m2 K 3834 4536 2942 1481

where Ae is the piston surface in contact with the ring. The value of the he for the rst ring is calculated 2673 W/m2K. In some part of a engine cycle, the ring pack is in contact with the upper surface of ring gap. During the remaining cycle duration, it is in contact with the lower surface of the ring gap. For 32% of the engine cycle, the heat transfer path is from the upper surface of the ring gap, and for the 68% of the engine cycle, the heat transfer path is from the lower surface of the ring gap [1]. Therefore, for the rst ring we have hup 2673 0:32 855 W=m2 K hdown 2673 0:68 1818 W=m2 K T T water 353 K The other rings are modeled similar to the rst ring. The values of convective heat transfer coecients are shown in Table 4. The same method is used to model the skirt where the ring resistance (R1) is zero. The value of the convective heat transfer coecient on skirt is given in Table 4. Convective heat transfer coecient for the region between the rings is 115 W/m2 K and the reference temperature is the oil temperature (383 K) [1]. The inner face of the ring gap is assumed to be adiabatic [1]. 3.2. The piston underside heat transfer boundary condition The piston underside cooling system in the piston under study is oil splash cooling. The piston underside is divided into two regions: Region 1. The crown underside is cooled by splash cooling type. The value of convective heat transfer coefcient is calculated from the following equation [3]:  0:35 N huc1 900 7 4600 Region 2. The skirt underside, the heat transfer coefcient value is calculated from the equation below [3]:  0:35 N huc2 240 8 4600

engines that the piston slap and the clearance between piston and cylinder are high, formation of cavitation regions increases. In this study, we neglect this phenomenon and it is assumed that the oil lm has its continuity. The convective heat transfer coecient in the waterjacket, hwater, is used to calculate R4 [5]. The values of convective heat transfer coecients for each cylinder are shown in Table 3. Since cylinder 4 has the worst condition, the calculations are performed on this cylinder: hwater 1:48 kW=m2 K 5

To model the rst ring, a heat transfer path is considered (Fig. 6) and the values of R1, . . . ,R4 are calculated. The eective heat transfer coecient is obtained from heff 1 Rtot Aeff 6

Table 4 Convective heat transfer coecients for the ring land and skirt in cylinder 4, T = 353 K h (W/m2 K) Ring Ring Ring Ring Ring Ring Skirt 1 1 2 2 3 3 up down up down up down 885 1818 420 891 482 1023 1443

Fig. 6. Heat transfer path from the rings.

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The calculations at 5000 RPM resulting hun1 925 W=m2 K hun2 250 W=m2 K T oil 383 K 3.3. Heat transfer from the piston pin The heat transfer coecient in this region is 1000 W/ m2 K with reference to the oil temperature [1]. 3.4. The crevice heat transfer coecient Since there is a small gap between piston crown and the liner, the captured gas temperature is the mean temperature of the crevice surfaces [6]. Therefore, the heat is conducted through the gas with the convective heat transfer coecient, Kgas. The heat transfer is modeled with a convective heat transfer to the cylinder wall: k T piston T wall hT piston T wall d k h d

There are also three similar methods to set the piston temperature boundary condition for the combustion model: 1. time and surface averaged values of piston top surface temperature; 2. locally time averaged values of piston top surface temperature; 3. fully locally transient values of piston top surface temperature. It is evident that in piston and combustion boundary condition treatments, the third methods lead to more accurate results. This is because it considers all the heat transfer uctuations locally. However, it is time consuming. Similarly, the second methods are more accurate than the rst options. This is because it considers local heat ux for the piston top surface. At this point, the dierences resulting from implementation of the above methods are compared to each other. 4.2. Applying transient boundary condition First, we discuss the eect of applying transient boundary condition during the cycle. The surface averaged value of heat ux (q00 ) variation on the piston crown is shown in Fig. 7a. By applying q00 as varying T and h during the cycle as input of NASTRAN and after transient analysis, the surface temperature of the piston is obtained (Fig. 7b). At the beginning of the cycle, heat is absorbed from the piston surface by cold gases. Moreover, other heat sinks like rings and underside oil cooling cause the piston surface to be cooled down. During the combustion, the heat is subjected to the piston surface. At the end of the cycle, although the temperature of the burnt gases is higher, the other heat sinks cause the piston surface to be cooled down. Our experience indicates that, KIVA-3V is not sensitive to small temperature variations on the boundary as shown in Fig. 7b. This variation is about 3 K or 0.5%. Therefore, the piston temperature variation during the cycle does not aect the results of KIVA-3V code. On the other hand, these variations do not aect the piston thermal analysis using NASTRAN. One can conclude that applying a variable heat ux boundary condition during the engine cycle does not aect the results of the piston thermal behavior. In addition, applying a variable piston temperature boundary condition during the engine cycle does not aect the results of combustion analysis. Thus, there is no need to use the third methods for combustion side boundary condition. 4.3. Surface averaged and spatial combustion boundary condition The dierence between applying a surface averaged combustion boundary condition and spatial combustion

where d is crevice clearance, 0.425 mm for the engine under study. For k = 0.037 W/m2 K, it gives h 88 W=m2 K; T T wall 400 K

4. The combustion side boundary condition The main heat source for the piston is the hot gases in the combustion chamber. For this boundary condition, this engine is modeled with KIVA-3V computational code. Piston temperature is one of the thermal boundary conditions in KIVA-3V. From the piston thermal analysis point of view, the heat ux of hot gases to the piston top surface (resulting from the KIVA-3V code) is required. Therefore, iteration is needed to obtain the correct boundary conditions. The heat ux from the hot gases is modeled with Tgas and hgas in NASTRAN. The temperature of piston top surface is used for KIVA-3V. 4.1. The combustion boundary condition treatment methods There are three methods of combustion boundary condition treatment 1. surface and cycle averaged values for the gas heat ux at the piston top surface; 2. locally cycle averaged values for the gas heat ux at the piston top surface; 3. fully locally transient values for the gas heat ux at the piston top surface.

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Fig. 7. (a) Piston top surface heat ux variation during one engine cycle and (b) temperature uctuations of a point on the piston top surface in one engine cycle.

boundary condition on the piston crown surface can be considered from dierent points of view. As we will see later, the heat ux on the piston top surface is not symmetric. This causes the temperature proles on piston crown to vary signicantly, especially at high engine speeds and loads. If we apply an averaged q00 on the piston surface, this eect would not be captured. There are many parameters that cause the heat ux (q00 ) to be nonsymmetric. Exhaust and intake valves, and spark plug locations, and combustion chamber shape are some examples of these parameters. Another issue is that, since there is not much heat ux around the piston crown, this eect is not considered, if we use an averaged heat ux in our calculation. Therefore, to get better and more accurate results for piston temperature, we have to use spatial combustion boundary condition for piston thermal analysis in NASTRAN. There are two treatment methods for temperature boundary condition in KIVA-3V, an averaged boundary temperature (both cycle and surface averaged) and spatial boundary temperature (cycle averaged). The main point is that if we use a surface averaged temperature as the input to the combustion code, the calculated q00 (heat ux on the piston top surface) will not be accurate enough for NASTRAN. Also, since the temperature variation on the piston top surface is about 30 K, surface averaging decreases the accuracy of the boundary modication, considerably. 4.4. Spatial cycle averaged boundary condition The heat ux (q00 ) from the hot gases and the gas temperature is averaged in an engine cycle for each element, using R 4p Ti
0

R 4p q00 i
0

q00 i hdh 4p

10

To obtain averaged h on any element of piston surface, one can use:  hi q00 i T i T p i 11

T i h d h 4p

Fig. 8. Computational system owchart.

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In these equations, i is the node number. The input le of NASTRAN code is a formatted le in which T and h of each point of piston crown should be entered in a special format. The results of steady state analysis of NASTRAN code give a new piston temperature and consequently new q00 prole. The comparison between the new and old piston temperature represents the convergence of the process. If the convergence is not achieved, a new Tp is guessed. After some iteration, the nal piston temperature is calculated. The owchart of this process is shown in Fig. 8. The convergence criterion is dened as follows: n P j T new T old j i i i1 < Error 12 n where n is the number of piston crown surface nodes. The value of error is considered 1 K. After six iterations, the convergence criterion is reached.

Fig. 10. Comparison of the computational and experimental pressure curves for cylinder 4.

5. Results The rst step in our study is to calibrate and validate the model. There are no experimental data for the engine piston temperature. Therefore, the piston temperature results for a similar engine were used for validation. The engine is a spark-ignited four stroke, 2400 cc [9]. To compare the results, we introduce non-dimensional piston temperatures (with maximum piston temperature) along the pin line of the piston top surface. The comparison of the results of computation and the experimental are shown in Fig. 9. To validate the combustion model the pressure curves resulted from KIVA-3V and experimental data in cylinder 4 are compared (Fig. 10). The results

show that, the experimental and computational data match relatively very well. The surface temperature and heat ux are shown in Fig. 11. As it can be seen, the temperature and heat ux on the piston surface is quite asymmetric. The heat ux under the intake valve is less than the other zones. The reason is due to the impact of inlet cold air during the intake and reduction of ame speed because of ame quenching in the intake valve zone. On the other zones, as the temperature of the combustion chamber wall are higher, the ame speed and turbulence increase which, lead to increasing the heat ux to the combustion chamber walls. The heat ux in turbulent ow is obtained from [10] q00 qml cp F T T w Prl Y ( R0 Pr RPR 1 where R0
1=4 1=2 cl K Y ml

13 R0 > 11:05 R0 < 11:05

l 1 ln R0 B11:05Pr RPR1 l k

14

15

Fig. 9. Comparison of the computational and experimental of nondimensional temperature on piston top surface.

were Prl is laminar Prandtl number, RPR, the inverse turbulent Prandtl number, ml, kinematic viscosity, k, Karman constant, Tw, wall temperature, K, kinematical energy and Y is the distance from the wall. The laminar Prandtl number is supposed to be constant and equal to Prl = 0.74. Also cp has no signicant variation. One of the eective parameters for q00 variations is the temperature dierence between gas and combustion chamber

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Fig. 11. (a) Piston top surface temperature after convergence (K) and (b) piston top surface heat ux after convergence (MW/m2).

wall. The parameter F represents the turbulence intensity of the ow. Fig. 12 shows the variation trend of q00 contours on the piston surface. On regions just under the spark plug, the heat ux intensity is less than the opposite regions which have higher heat ux. The regions near the exhaust valve have higher heat ux compared to intake valve regions. The points that are

indicated by labels 1, 2 and 3 are of special interests which are explained here in detail. Fig. 13 shows the heat ux on these three regions in a complete cycle. Point 2 has the maximum heat ux while point 1 has the minimum. Fig. 14 shows the temperature variation in these regions. This gure shows that the gas temperature has

Fig. 12. Variation trend of the piston top surface heat ux during the combustion process (MW/m2).

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Fig. 13. Comparison of the piston top surface heat ux at three dierent points.

Fig. 15. Comparison of the gas density on the piston top surface at three dierent points.

Fig. 14. Comparison of the gas temperature on the piston top surface at three dierent points.

Fig. 16. Comparison of the F on the piston top surface at three dierent points.

minor contribution in heat ux dierences because at all the three points temperature rises nearly in the same manner. Density variation aects the heat ux in another manner. As the ame front leaves the spark plug, the pressure of the unburnt gases ahead of the ame increases resulting in increasing the density that leads to increasing the heat ux. During the combustion, point 3 has a higher density than points 1 and 2. Also the density of point 2 is more than point 1 in this period (Fig. 15). This is one of the reasons for heat ux dierence at these three points. Fig. 16 shows the variations of F at these three points. It can be seen that point 2

has the higher value of F. This parameter is related to the turbulence of the ow. Fig. 17 shows the turbulent kinematic energy variation for these three points. As a result, point 2 has the highest value of turbulent kinetic energy, during the combustion period. Table 5 shows a comparison between three methods of combustion side boundary condition treatment. It is concluded that the transient boundary condition is very time consuming. In this case, the results of thermal analysis are within engineering approximations. Also, the comparison show applying a time varying piston temperature boundary condition during the engine cycle does not aect the results of combustion analysis.

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analysis. In addition, applying the transient boundary condition is very time consuming and does not aect the results of piston thermal analysis within engineering approximations. Moreover, applying a time varying piston temperature boundary condition during the engine cycle does not aect the results of combustion analysis.

Acknowledgement The authors would like to express thanks to Mr. Aghakhanlou, Mr. Rajabali, MR. Skandarpour, Mr. Ziaee, Mr. Salavati Zadeh, and all the partners in Irankhodro Powertrain Company and University of Tehran.

Fig. 17. Comparison of the turbulent kinetic energy on the piston top surface at three dierent points.

References
[1] C.H. Li, Piston thermal deformation and friction considerations, SAE Paper 820086, 1982. [2] Properties and Selection: Irons, Steels and High Performance Alloy, ASM Handbook, vol. 1, ASM International, 1990. [3] Y. Liu, R.D. Reitz, Multidimensional modeling of combustion chamber surface temperatures, SAE Paper 971539, 1997. [4] Y. Liu, R.D. Reitz, Modeling of heat conduction within chamber walls for multidimensional internal combustion engine simulations, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 41 (67) (1998) 859869. [5] M. Tahar Abbas, P. Maspeyrot, A. Bounif, J. Frene, A thermomechanical model of direct injection diesel engine piston, in: Proceedings of the institution of mechanical engineers, Part D: Automotive Engineering, vol. 218, IMechE, 2004. [6] R.J. Jenkin, E.H. James, W.M. Malalasekera, Modeling the eects of combustion and turbulence on the near-wall temperature gradients in the cylinder of spark ignition engines, in: Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part D, vol. 212, IMechE, 1998. [7] S.V. Bohac, D.M. Baker, D.N. Assanis, A global model for steady state and transient SI engine heat transfer studies, SAE Paper 960073, 1996. [9] B. Heywood John, Internal Combustion Engine Fundamentals, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1988. [10] A.A. Admeson, Kiva-3v: a block structured KIVA program for engines with vertical or canted valves, Los Alamos National Laboratory Report, LA-11560, NM, USA, May 1997.

Table 5 Comparison between three combustion side boundary condition treatment methods Surface and Spatial and time averaged time averaged Time (h) Accuracy 100 Low (For a good estimation) 150 Good (For engineering application) Fully transient 1700 High (For considering piston and combustion transient interaction)

6. Conclusion Three dierent combustion side boundary condition treatment methods for piston thermal analysis are carried out and a good interface between NASTRAN and KIVA-3V codes is developed. It is found that, using spatial and time averaged combustion side boundary condition is an eective way as is compared with surface and time averaged boundary condition in piston thermal