scholarly journals Use of the gas ionization signal for combustion process diagnostics in the cylinder of a spark ignition engine

2017 ◽  
Vol 171 (4) ◽  
pp. 196-200
Author(s):  
Łukasz FIEDKIEWICZ ◽  
Ireneusz PIELECHA ◽  
Krzysztof WISŁOCKI

The running diagnostics of the combustion process in an internal combustion engine is essential for increasing its efficiency and to improving its performance indicators. The modern diagnostics of this process no longer concerns only measurements of fast-changing thermodynamic variables, but also measurements of other parameters allowing for its evaluation. The use of electrical or optical methods in diagnostics enables the evaluation of local process parameters, such as occurrence of the flame and its temperature distribution. Actually, there are some new methods under investigation which are proposed for this kind of diagnostic. This article focuses on demonstrating the potential for using an electric signal from the gas ionization to estimate the maximum combustion pressure in a cylinder of an SI engine. This is a comparative analysis of the gas ionization current signal in the cylinder and the fast-changing pressure at fixed operating points of a 4-stroke natural gas powered engine. The study was carried out on a one-cylinder 4-stroke SI engine equipped with a cylinder pressure recording system and monitoring of the cylinder ionization current using appropriate measuring systems. The influence of engine operating conditions on the ability to determine cylinder pressure based on the ionization current signal was analyzed. This impact assessment was analyzed statistically and a strong correlation was found between the analyzed signals. The obtained results point in the potential direction of development of this type of measuring system.

2001 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 263-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
B Lee ◽  
Y G Guezennec ◽  
G Rizzoni

In recent years, several new sensor technologies have been developed and implemented within automotive industries due to the increasing requirements for improved engine performance and emission reduction. It requires detailed and specified knowledge of the combustion process inside the engine cylinder along with a sophisticated technique in engine diagnostics and control. During the last few years, the ionization current signal detection has been the emerging technology in the new sensor developments, in which the spark plug is used as a combustion probe, to improve the performance and emissions of an automobile engine. In this paper, a novel methodology will be presented which allows the cycle-resolved as well as the mean-value estimation of the air-fuel ratio and in-cylinder pressure based on the ionization current signal measurements. The implementation details of this methodology as well as extensive results will be presented for a wide range of air-fuel ratios. The main advantage of this new approach to process the ionization signal is its strong potential for real-time estimation of the air-fuel ratio and combustion diagnostics of individual cylinders and engine cycles. All the complex physics during the actual events (combustion process, ion generation, engine dynamics, etc.) are automatically self-extracted by this technique from acquired data in an initial off-line mapping phase. Once this has been performed, the air-fuel ratio and in-cylinder pressure can easily be estimated for each individual cylinder and combustion event in real-time with few computational requirements. Hence, this methodology has a high potential for the real-time combustion diagnostics and engine control based on the air-fuel ratio and in-cylinder pressure, while eliminating the requirements for installing expensive air-fuel ratio and in-cylinder pressure sensors. The results indicate that estimation of the cycle-resolved air-fuel ratio and in-cylinder pressure is reasonably accurate and robust, despite the inherently noisy character of the ionization signals, with estimation errors typically in the order of 2 per cent or less, except for very fuel-rich conditions.


Author(s):  
Özgür Solmaz ◽  
Habib Gürbüz ◽  
Mevlüt Karacor

Abstract In first stage, a machine learning (ML) was performed to predict in-cylinder pressure using both fuzzy logic (FL) and artificial neural networks (ANN) depending on the results of experimental studies in a spark ignition (SI) engine. In the ML phase, the experimental in-cylinder pressure data of SI engine was used. SI engine was operated at stoichiometric air–fuel mixture (φ = 1.0) at 1200, 1400, and 1600 rpm engine speeds. Six different ignition timings, ranging from 15 to 45 °CA, were used for each engine speed. Correlations (R2) between data from in-cylinder pressure obtained via FL and ANN models and data form experimental in-cylinder pressure were determined. R2 values over 0.995 were obtained at an ML stage of ANN model for all test conditions of the engine. However, R2 values were remained between range of 0.820–0.949 with the FL model for different engine speeds and ignition timings. In the second stage, in-cylinder pressure prediction was performed by using an ANN model for engine operating conditions where no experimental results were obtained. Furthermore, indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) values were calculated by predicting in-cylinder pressure data for different engine operation conditions, and then compared with experimental IMEP values. The results show that the in-cylinder pressure and IMEP results estimated with the trained ANN model are fairly close to the experimental results. Moreover, it was found that using the trained ANN model, the ignition timing corresponding to the maximum brake torque (MBT) used in the engine management systems and engine studies could be determined with high accuracy.


2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruixue C Li ◽  
Guoming G Zhu ◽  
Yifan Men

This article presents a control-oriented two-zone reaction-based zero-dimensional model to accurately describe the combustion process of a spark-ignited engine for real-time simulations, and the developed model will be used for model-based control design and validation. A two-zone modeling approach is adopted, where the combustion chamber is divided into the burned (reaction) and unburned (pre-mixed) zones. The mixture thermodynamic properties and individual chemical species in two zones are taken into account in the modeling process. Instead of using the conventional pre-determined Wiebe-based combustion model, a two-step chemical reaction model is utilized to predict the combustion process along with important thermodynamic parameters such as the mass-fraction-burned, in-cylinder pressure, temperatures, and individual species mass changes in both zones. Sensitivities of model parameters are analyzed during the model calibration process. As a result, one set of calibration parameters is used to predict combustion characteristics over all engine operating conditions studied in this article, which is the major advantage of the proposed method. Also, the proposed modeling approach is capable of modeling the combustion process under different air-to-fuel ratios, ignition timings, and exhaust-gas-recirculation rates for real-time simulations. As the by-product of the model, engine knock can also be predicted based on the Arrhenius integral in the unburned zone, which is valuable for model-based knock control. The proposed combustion model is intensively validated using the experimental data with a peak relative prediction error of 6.2% for the in-cylinder pressure.


2021 ◽  
pp. 146808742110399
Author(s):  
Veniero Giglio ◽  
Livia Della Ragione ◽  
Alessandro di Gaeta ◽  
Natale Rispoli

Ionization current measured at the spark plug during combustion in spark ignition engines has often been proposed to determine the crank-angle at combustion pressure peak, namely the peak pressure angle, for the purpose of regulating spark timing to attain maximum brake torque (MBT). The proposal is based on the assumption that agreement exists between peak pressure angle and the angular position of the ionization current second peak, although no one has ever proved it by an appropriate statistical analysis. The aim of this work, for the first time and by rigorous statistical methods, is to prove the agreement between Peak Pressure Angle and Ionization Current Second Peak Angle (ICSPA), without which a MBT control via ICSPA would be ineffective. Our experimental database consisted of about 9000 pairs of Peak Pressure Angle and Ionization Current Second Peak Angle values corresponding to 90 different operating conditions of a spark ignition engine. A two-sample comparison was first carried out between mean values of Peak Pressure Angle and Ionization Current Second Peak Angle, which showed a statistically significant difference between them. Then Bland-Altman analysis (Lancet, 1986), widely known and used for checking agreement between two different measurement methods, was conducted. It demonstrated that under almost all the experimental operating conditions, there was no agreement between the Ionization Current Second Peak Angle and the Peak Pressure Angle.


2014 ◽  
Vol 984-985 ◽  
pp. 957-961
Author(s):  
Vijayashree ◽  
P. Tamil Porai ◽  
N.V. Mahalakshmi ◽  
V. Ganesan

This paper presents the modeling of in-cylinder pressure variation of a four-stroke single cylinder spark ignition engine. It uses instantaneous properties of working fluid, viz., gasoline to calculate heat release rates, needed to quantify combustion development. Cylinder pressure variation with respect to either volume or crank angle gives valuable information about the combustion process. The analysis of the pressure – volume or pressure-theta data of a engine cycle is a classical tool for engine studies. This paper aims at demonstrating the modeling of pressure variation as a function of crank angle as well as volume with the help of MATLAB program developed for this purpose. Towards this end, Woschni heat release model is used for the combustion process. The important parameter, viz., peak pressure for different compression ratios are used in the analysis. Predicted results are compared with experimental values obtained for a typical compression ratio of 8.3.


Energies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 1566 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.D. Martinez-Boggio ◽  
S.S. Merola ◽  
P. Teixeira Lacava ◽  
A. Irimescu ◽  
P.L. Curto-Risso

To mitigate the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, energy production processes must change from fossil to renewable resources. Bioenergy utilization from agricultural residues can be a step towards achieving this goal. Syngas (fuel obtained from biomass gasification) has been proved to have the potential of replacing fossil fuels in stationary internal combustion engines (ICEs). The processes associated with switching from traditional fuels to alternatives have always led to intense research efforts in order to have a broad understanding of the behavior of the engine in all operating conditions. In particular, attention needs to be focused on fuels containing relatively high concentrations of hydrogen, due to its faster propagation speed with respect to traditional fossil energy sources. Therefore, a combustion study was performed in a research optical SI engine, for a comparison between a well-established fuel such as methane (the main component of natural gas) and syngas. The main goal of this work is to study the effect of inert gases in the fuel mixture and that of air dilution during lean fuelling. Thus, two pure syngas blends (mixtures of CO and H2) and their respective diluted mixtures (CO and H2 with 50vol% of inert gases, CO2 and N2) were tested in several air-fuel ratios (stoichiometric to lean burn conditions). Initially, the combustion process was studied in detail by traditional thermodynamic analysis and then optical diagnostics were applied thanks to the optical access through the piston crown. Specifically, images were taken in the UV-visible spectrum of the entire cycle to follow the propagation of the flame front. The results show that hydrogen promotes flame propagation and reduces its distortion, as well as resulting in flames evolving closer to the spark plug. All syngas blends show a stable combustion process, even in conditions of high air and fuel dilution. In the leanest case, real syngas mixtures present a decrease in terms of performance due to significant reduction in volumetric efficiency. However, this condition strongly decreases pollutant emissions, with nitrogen oxide (NOx) concentrations almost negligible.


Author(s):  
Fazal Um Min Allah ◽  
Caio Henrique Rufino ◽  
Waldyr Luiz Ribeiro Gallo ◽  
Clayton Barcelos Zabeu

Abstract The flex-fuel engines are quite capable of running on gasohol and hydrous ethanol. However, the in-cylinder cyclic variations, which are inherently present in spark-ignition (SI) engines, affect the performance of these engines. Therefore, a comprehensive analysis is required to evaluate the effects of in-cylinder cyclic variations of a flex-fuel engine. The experiments were carried out by using Brazilian commercial Gasohol E27 (mixture of 27% anhydrous ethanol in gasoline) and hydrous ethanol E95h (5% water by volume in ethanol) as fuels for a commercial flex-fuel spark ignition engine. A comparison between the cyclic variations of gasohol and hydrous ethanol is presented in this paper. Moreover, the effects of engine operating parameters (i.e., engine speed, engine load and relative air fuel ratio) on cyclic variations are also investigated. The acquired data of in-cylinder pressure and combustion durations are evaluated by carrying out a statistical analysis. The coefficient of variation for indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) did not exceed the limit of 5% for all tested conditions. Higher cyclic variability of maximum in-cylinder pressure is observed for gasohol fuel and higher engine speeds. The variability of in-cylinder combustion is also evaluated with the help of different combustion stages, which are characterized by corresponding crank positions of 10%, 50% and 90% mass fractions burned.


2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Slobodan Popovic ◽  
Miroljub Tomic

In this paper, novel method for obtaining information about combustion process in individual cylinders of a multi-cylinder Spark Ignition Engine based on instantaneous crankshaft angular velocity is presented. The method is based on robust box constrained Levenberg-Marquardt minimization of nonlinear Least Squares given for measured and simulated instantaneous crankshaft angular speed which is determined from the solution of the engine dynamics torque balance equation. Combination of in-house developed comprehensive Zero-Dimensional Two-Zone SI engine combustion model and analytical friction loss model in angular domain have been applied to provide sensitivity and error analysis regarding Wiebe combustion model parameters, heat transfer coefficient and compression ratio. The analysis is employed to evaluate the basic starting assumption and possibility to provide reliable combustion analysis based on instantaneous engine crankshaft angular speed.


2013 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jovan Doric ◽  
Ivan Klinar

A zero dimensional model has been used to investigate the combustion performance of a four cylinder petrol engine with unconventional piston motion. The main feature of this new spark ignition (SI) engine concept is the realization of quasi-constant volume (QCV) during combustion process. Presented mechanism is designed to obtain a specific motion law which provides better fuel consumption of internal combustion (IC) engines. These advantages over standard engine are achieved through synthesis of unconventional piston mechanism. The numerical calculation was performed for several cases of different piston mechanism parameters, compression ratio and engine speed. Calculated efficiency and power diagrams are plotted and compared with performance of ordinary SI engine. The results show that combustion during quasi-constant volume has significant impact on improvement of efficiency. The main aim of this paper is to find a proper kinematics parameter of unconventional piston mechanism for most efficient heat addition in SI engines.


Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (21) ◽  
pp. 5548
Author(s):  
Luca Marchitto ◽  
Cinzia Tornatore ◽  
Luigi Teodosio

Stringent exhaust emission and fuel consumption regulations impose the need for new solutions for further development of internal combustion engines. With this in mind, a refined control of the combustion process in each cylinder can represent a useful and affordable way to limit cycle-to-cycle and cylinder-to-cylinder variation reducing CO2 emission. In this paper, a twin-cylinder turbocharged Port Fuel Injection–Spark Ignition engine is experimentally and numerically characterized under different operating conditions in order to investigate the influence of cycle-to-cycle variation and cylinder-to-cylinder variability on the combustion and performance. Significant differences in the combustion behavior between cylinders were found, mainly due to a non-uniform effective in-cylinder air/fuel (A/F) ratio. For each cylinder, the coefficients of variation (CoVs) of selected combustion parameters are used to quantify the cyclic dispersion. Experimental-derived CoV correlations representative of the engine behavior are developed, validated against the measurements in various speed/load points and then coupled to an advanced 1D model of the whole engine. The latter is employed to reproduce the experimental findings, taking into account the effects of cycle-to-cycle variation. Once validated, the whole model is applied to optimize single cylinder operation, mainly acting on the spark timing and fuel injection, with the aim to reduce the specific fuel consumption and cyclic dispersion.


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