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abstract
Article history:
The addition of hydrogen is an effective way for improving the gasoline engine perfor-
mance at lean conditions. In this paper, an experiment aiming at studying the effect of
8 March 2010
gasoline engine under various loads and lean conditions was carried out. An electronically
controlled hydrogen port-injection system was added to the original engine while keeping
the gasoline injection system unchanged. A hybrid electronic control unit was developed
and applied to govern the spark timings, injection timings and durations of hydrogen and
Keywords:
gasoline. The test was performed at a constant engine speed of 1400 rpm, which could
Hydrogen
represent the engine speed in the typical city-driving conditions with a heavy traffic. Two
Gasoline
hydrogen volume fractions in the total intake of 0% and 3% were achieved through
Combustion
adjusting the hydrogen injection duration according to the air flow rate. At a specified
Emissions
hydrogen addition level, gasoline flow rate was decreased to ensure that the excess air
ratios were kept at 1.2 and 1.4, respectively. For a given hydrogen blending fraction and
excess air ratio, the engine load, which was represented by the intake manifolds absolute
pressure (MAP), was increased by increasing the opening of the throttle valve. The spark
timing for maximum brake torque (MBT) was adopted for all tests. The experimental
results demonstrated that the engine brake mean effective pressure (Bmep) was increased
after hydrogen addition only at low load conditions. However, at high engine loads, the
hybrid hydrogenegasoline engine (HHGE) produced smaller Bmep than the original engine.
The engine brake thermal efficiency was distinctly raised with the increase of MAP for both
the original engine and the HHGE. The coefficient of variation in indicated mean effective
pressure (COVimep) for the HHGE was reduced with the increase of engine load. The
addition of hydrogen was effective on improving gasoline engine operating instability at
low load and lean conditions. HC and CO emissions were decreased and NOx emissions
were increased with the increase of engine load. The influence of engine load on CO2
emission was insignificant. All in all, the effect of hydrogen addition on improving engine
combustion and emissions performance was more pronounced at low loads than at high
loads.
2010 Professor T. Nejat Veziroglu. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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1.
Introduction
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2.
2.1.
Experimental setup
The prototype engine used in this study is an in-line, 1.6 L, fourcylinder, SI engine manufactured by Beijing Hyundai Motors,
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2.2.
Experimental procedure
The experiment was started when the engine was fully warmed
up. During the test, the coolant and lubricant oil temperatures
were kept around 90 and 95 1 C, respectively to minimize
their negative effects on the test results. The engine speed was
fixed at 1400 rpm which represents the engine speed under the
typically congested city-driving conditions. Since the purpose
of this paper is to investigate the effect of manifolds absolute
pressure on the performance of the HHGE at part-load conditions, the HHGE is fueled with hydrogenegasoline blends in this
experiment. The HECU was used to govern the injection
timings and durations of hydrogen and gasoline based on the
sensor signals acquired from the OECU and commands from
a calibration computer. The hydrogen flow rate determined by
hydrogen injection duration was adjusted according to the air
flow rate to ensure that hydrogen volume fractions in the total
intake gas (hydrogen air) were kept at 0% and 3%, respectively. For a specified hydrogen volume fraction in the intake,
the gasoline flow rate was gradually reduced to keep the global
excess air ratio of the hydrogenegasolineeair mixture at 1.2
and 1.4, respectively. The hydrogen volume fraction in the
intake aH2 and the global excess air ratio of the hydrogenegasolineeair mixture (l) are defined as:
aH2 VH2 = VH2 Vair 100%
(1)
Vair rair
VH2 rH2 AFH2 mgas AFgas
(2)
In Eqs. (1) and (2), VH2 and Vair are the measured volumetric flow
rates of hydrogen and air at normal conditions (L/min),
respectively; mgas represents the measured gasoline mass flow
rate (g/min); rair and rH2 symbolize air and hydrogen densities at
normal conditions (g/L); AFgas and AFH2 are the stoichiometric
air-to-fuel ratios of gasoline and hydrogen (AFgas 14.6 and
AFH2 34:3). The hydrogen and gasoline were injected into the
intake ports simultaneously at the gasoline injection timings of
the original engine at the specified engine speed and manifolds
absolute pressure. According to the measured results, hydrogen
energy fraction in the total fuel is about 10% and 12% at excess
air ratios of 1.2 and 1.4, respectively for all testing points.
During the test, the excess air ratio was also monitored by
a Horiba MEXA-110 A/F analyzer (measurement deviation:
0.1 A/F at A/F 14.7) with an O2 sensor inserted into the
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3.
3.1.
Brake mean effective pressure and brake thermal
efficiency
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3.2.
Combustion analysis
the HHGE at the same MAPs and excess air ratios compared
with the original engine and such a trend is more markedly
observed at low load conditions, demonstrating hydrogen
addition is a quite effective way for improving the gasoline
engine combustion at low load and lean conditions.
The maximum cylinder temperature (Tmax) strongly influences NOx emissions and cylinder temperature at exhaust
valve opening (Tevo) directly reflects exhaust losses. Fig. 5 and
Fig. 6 plot the variations of Tmax and Tevo with MAP at 1400 rpm
and two hydrogen addition levels, respectively. Tmax and Tevo
in this paper are calculated through PV mRT [33]. As it is
seen from Fig. 5, Tmax distinctly rises with the increase of MAP
for all hydrogen blending levels and excess air ratios due to
the increased fuel energy flow rate which promotes the
combustion at high loads. Since hydrogen stimulates the
combustion and the flame development and propagation
periods of the HHGE are obviously shorter than those of the
original engine (see Figs. 3 and 4), Tmax is increased after the
addition of hydrogen at the same MAPs and excess air ratios
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3.3.
Cyclic variation
The coefficient of variation in indicated mean effective pressure (COVimep) is widely used to characterize engine cyclic
variation. COVimep is calculated through equations given in
Ref. [34]. Fig. 8 shows the variations of COVimep with MAP at
1400 rpm and two excess air ratios. It can be found from Fig. 8
that COVimeps of the 3% HHGE and the original engine at
l 1.2 decrease steadily and COVimep of the original engine at
l 1.4 drops sharply with the increase of MAP. COVimep of
the original engine reaches 10.8% at the MAP of 35.8 kPa and
l 1.4 which is basically the lean burn limit of the original
engine at the specified test condition. When MAP is further
increased, COVimep of the original engine at l 1.4 drops
obviously due to the raised cylinder temperature and reduced
residual dilution which benefit the complete burning of
gasoline. Since the low ignition energy and wide flammability
of hydrogen ensures the flame stability of early stage
combustion and promotes the hydrogenegasoline mixture to
be combusted quickly, COVimep is improved for the HHGE at
low load and lean conditions compared with the gasoline
engine. At the same time any methods that help stimulate the
flame speed would result in an improved engine working
stability [35]. Thus, COVimep is continuously reduced with the
increase of MAP and hydrogen addition level at a specified
excess air ratio. However, as it is shown in Fig. 8, the effect of
hydrogen addition on reducing COVimep is less obvious at high
loads than at low loads due to the improved combustion of the
original engine at high loads.
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3.4.
Exhaust emissions
The HC, CO, CO2 and NOx emissions of the 3% HHGE and
original engine at 1400 rpm and various MAPs and two excess
air ratios are displayed from Figs. 9e12. Fig. 9 shows the
variations of HC emissions with MAP at 1400 rpm and two
excess air ratios. HC emissions from the gasoline engine at
l 1.4 sharply increase to 6749 ppm when MAP drops to
35.8 kPa due to the incomplete burning of gasoline at very lean
and low load conditions. HC emissions from both the original
engine and the 3% HHGE are distinctly reduced with the
increase of MAP for two excess air ratios, since the increased
engine load provides better condition for the fuel to be
completely burned. Due to the short quenching distance and
wide flammability of hydrogen, the HHGE expels less HC
emissions than the original engine within the tested MAP
range, especially at low MAPs under which the combustion is
deteriorated due to the increased residual dilution and dropped cylinder temperature.
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4.
Conclusions
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 50976005) and Beijing Municipal
Natural Science Foundation (Grant No. 3082004). The authors
also appreciate all students in the group for their help with the
experiment.
references
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