A Two-Stroke Range Extender Engine for Heavy Duty Battery Electric vehicle applications

Turbo, two-stroke, range extender, BE

Spark ignition engine performance, standard emissions and particulates using GDI, PFI-CNG and DI-CNG systems

Gaseous fuels, e.g., natural gas, biogas, have several advantages over liquid fuels owing to their favorable physical and chemical properties, e.g., lower carbon numbers in the fuel composition and no issues regarding fuel evaporation. The present study investigated compressed natural gas (CNG) port fuel injection (PFI) and direct injection (DI) systems compared to gasoline direct injection (GDI) cases in a spark ignition (SI) naturally aspirated single cylinder engine at stoichiometric conditions. The tests included usual engine working points – from 4.5 bar IMEP to 9 bar IMEP engine load at different engine speeds – from 1500 rpm to 2500 rpm. The main aim was to investigate how gaseous fuels can improve the SI engine efficiency, reduce standard emissions and particulates, and explain the benefits of a natural gas DI system versus standard gas PFI and GDI systems. Analysis of the results showed that the rate of heat release of natural gas was lower than that of gasoline fuel. However, the stable combustion process of DI-CNG gave additional benefits, e.g., increased turbulence in the cylinder, which increased the combustion rate and affected the exhaust gas formation. The highest engine efficiency was achieved with the same natural gas DI system. The highest iSHC, iSCO, iSCO2 and iSNOx emissions reduction achieved at low and part load conditions with DI-CNG compared to GDI combustion. Particulates formation was lower with the gaseous fuel compared to gasoline. Additional benefits of lower particulate numbers among three injection systems were observed with DI-CNG combustion

DI-CNG injector nozzle design influence on SI engine standard emissions and particulates at different injection timings

Compressed natural gas direct injection (DI-CNG) systems in spark ignition (SI) internal combustion engines have shown that it can give several benefits compared to CNG port fuel injection systems. However, the DI-CNG injector nozzle head design and gas jet formation may greatly influence engine exhaust gas emissions and performance. Present experimental study investigated the influence of 7 different nozzle head designs of sprayguided DI-CNG injectors on the combustion process, engine performance, standard emissions, and particulate number (PN) when methane fuel was injected at different injection timings (SOI) and injection pressures (18 bar and 50 bar). The nozzle heads had two main design patterns – heads with small multi holes/orifices and heads with larger crevices (swirl or umbrella spray pattern). Naturally aspirated SI engine tests were conducted at part load (6 bar IMEP) and wide-open throttle (WOT) at 2000 rpm engine speed. The results revealed that the difference between the nozzle heads was small when the fuel was injected at an early stage of the intake stroke (310–350 CAD bTDC) either at part load or high load. However, for late injection timing (130–190 CAD bTDC), the design of the DI-CNG injector nozzle head had a large impact on the combustion stability, standard emissions formation and particulates. Multi-hole nozzle heads showed improved CO2, CO, THC, total PN, and slightly higher NOx emissions compared to nozzle heads with larger crevices. For some of the nozzles, the SOI could be retarded more than for other injector head designs at higher injection pressure whilst still ensuring an acceptable engine performance in terms of combustion stability, power output and emissions formation. Overall, 50-bar injection pressure and a late injection timing under WOT conditions achieved higher engine load levels with all injector nozzle types. Images acquired using an optical endoscope technique with a high-speed video camera showed that a yellow flame was present for all nozzle types at a low injection pressure and late SOI. Increasing the injection pressure reduced the injection duration, improved air/fuel mixing which resulted in the reduced byellow flame formation and lower PN for most of the nozzle heads

Evaluation of a Back-up Range Extender and Other Heavy-Duty BEV-Supporting Systems

Electric powertrains in terms of battery electric vehicles (BEV) are considered to be very interesting for heavy truck transportations. The challenge is the need for very large onboard energy and batteries. Long-term fuel cells (FCs) are considered an interesting support system for heavy-duty BEV, but in the short term, a range extender (REX) is also interesting. A heavy-duty BEV with 970 kWh batteries installed can handle 27% of all possible missions for the Scania fleet considering daily recharging. The back-up range extender (BUREX) can expand this figure to 55% utilized 20 days per year. If a customer has a few very energy-demanding use cases each year and does not want to pay for all the batteries needed, the BUREX may be an especially good option. The BUREX reduces life-cycle CO2 emissions, irrespective of the generation mix of the grid supplying the electricity used in vehicle manufacturing and battery charging. The BUREX reuse of the existing electric components of the BEV powertrain enables the installation of a 10% larger battery pack while being 80% less costly. The BUREX also adds redundancy to the BEV concept while recharging infrastructure improves, especially in rural places. These results indicate that the BUREX concept is a powerful short-term solution that could enable greater use of HD FC and BEV trucks while charging infrastructure and FC technologies gradually become more mature

Source Term Model Approaches to Film Cooling Simulations

Film cooling simulations using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) are very difficult and extremely computer power demanding. This thesis deals with the development of a method to save computer power for these types of simulations. The cooling air is injected using additions to the source terms of the discretised governing equations. Cell lengths up to about one or two cooling hole diameters are used, thereby precluding modelling of the detailed flow around each cooling hole. Three different models for distributing the source terms are evaluated. In the first model, the sources are distributed to only one cell, namely the cell closest to the cooling hole, resulting in a poorly penetrating jet. To obtain better jet penetration and to be able to better control the concentration of coolant at the wall, the second model distributes the sources as a line source. This model produced reasonable results for the heat transfer rate on a film-cooled nozzle guide vane but not for temperature comparisons on multi-row effusion-cooled plates. The results were found to be sensitive to some input parameters. The third model uses limited parts of source term fields, evaluated from the averaged solutions of detailed jet simulations. This model showed the best and most realistic injection of the coolant. Owing to the different qualities of the results, especially for the first and second models, the method should be seen as a ``last way out`` when it is not possible to make detailed 3D simulations of high quality due to a lack of computer power

Source Term Model Approaches to Film Cooling Simulations

Film cooling simulations using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) are very difficult and extremely computer power demanding. This thesis deals with the development of a method to save computer power for these types of simulations. The cooling air is injected using additions to the source terms of the discretised governing equations. Cell lengths up to about one or two cooling hole diameters are used, thereby precluding modelling of the detailed flow around each cooling hole. Three different models for distributing the source terms are evaluated. In the first model, the sources are distributed to only one cell, namely the cell closest to the cooling hole, resulting in a poorly penetrating jet. To obtain better jet penetration and to be able to better control the concentration of coolant at the wall, the second model distributes the sources as a line source. This model produced reasonable results for the heat transfer rate on a film-cooled nozzle guide vane but not for temperature comparisons on multi-row effusion-cooled plates. The results were found to be sensitive to some input parameters. The third model uses limited parts of source term fields, evaluated from the averaged solutions of detailed jet simulations. This model showed the best and most realistic injection of the coolant. Owing to the different qualities of the results, especially for the first and second models, the method should be seen as a ``last way out`` when it is not possible to make detailed 3D simulations of high quality due to a lack of computer power

Experimental Investigation of the Influence of Boost on Combustion and Particulate Emissions in Optical and Metal SGDI-Engines Operated in Stratified Mode

Boosting and stratified operation can be used to increase the fuel efficiency of modern gasoline direct-injected (GDI) engines. In modern downsized GDI engines, boosting is standard to achieve a high power output. However, boosted GDI-engines have mostly been operated in homogenous mode and little is known about the effects of operating a boosted GDI-engine in stratified mode. <p/> This study employed optical and metal engines to examine how boosting influences combustion and particulate emission formation in a spray-guided GDI (SGDI), single cylinder research engine. The setup of the optical and metal engines was identical except the optical engine allowed optical access through the piston and cylinder liner. <p/> The engines were operated in steady state mode at five different engine operating points representing various loads and speeds. The engines were boosted with compressed air and operated at three levels of boost, as well as atmospheric pressure for comparison. The fuel used was market gasoline (95 RON) blended with 10% ethanol. The spark plug and injector were mounted in parallel with the intake valves. The gas motion induced by the engine head was primarily tumble motion with a small amount of swirl. <p/> Results on particulate emissions indicated that nucleation mode particulates increased with increasing boost. In contrast, agglomeration mode particulates decreased with increasing boost pressure. The combustion was found to consist of a yellow flame in the center of the combustion chamber and a pre-mixed blue flame in the perimeter. The optical studies indicated that the flame area decreased with increasing boost

Experimental Investigation of Methane Direct Injection with Stratified Charge Combustion in Optical SI Single Cylinder Engine

This paper assesses methane low pressure direct injection with stratified charge in a SI engine to highlight its potential and downsides. Experiments were carried out in a spark ignited single cylinder optical engine with stratified, homogeneous lean and stoichiometric operational mode, with focus on stratified mode. A dual coil ignition system was used in stratified mode in order to achieve sufficient combustion stability. The fuel injection pressure for the methane was 18 bar. Results show that stratified combustion with methane spark ignited direct injection is possible at 18 bar fuel pressure and that the indicated specific fuel consumption in stratified mode was 28% lower compared to the stoichiometric mode. Combustion and emission spectrums during the combustion process were captured with two high-speed video cameras. Combustion images, cylinder pressure data and heat release analysis showed that there are fairly high cycle-to-cycle variations in the combustion. Both blue pre-mixed flame and soot luminescence occurred in the combustion. The occurrence of soot luminescence was also supported by the emission spectrum. Soot formation sources were found to be localized randomly in the bulk flame but not on the piston nor in the vicinity of the spark plug. These findings illustrate the difficulty of achieving proper mixing between air and methane resulting in fairly high cycle-to-cycle variations in the combustion and fuel rich areas which create a source of soot