Evolution of Heavy Duty Natural Gas Engines - Stoichiometric, Carbureted and Spark Ignited to Lean Burn, Fuel Injected and Micro-Pilot

1997 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. John Beck ◽  
Robert L. Barkhimer ◽  
William P. Johnson ◽  
Hoi C. Wong ◽  
Kresimir Gebert
Author(s):  
D. Ryan Williams ◽  
Henry Knutzen ◽  
Domenico Chiera ◽  
Gregory J. Hampson

Increasingly restrictive limits on NOx levels are driving the change from lean-burn to stoichiometric combustion strategies on heavy-duty on-highway natural gas engines in order to take advantage of inexpensive and effective three-way catalyst technology. The change to stoichiometric combustion has led to increased tendency for engine knock due to higher in-cylinder temperatures. Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR) has been proposed as a method to suppress knock via charge dilution while maintaining a stoichiometric air-fuel ratio. Two of the more common EGR driving architectures and the challenges associated with each architecture are described. A series of engine tests were devised and performed on a 7-liter heavy-duty natural gas engine to explore the relationships between EGR knock suppression and engine backpressure. A unique concept for an external EGR pumping cart which allowed for the exploration of higher EGR rates independent of backpressure is also described. Results showed that for the conditions tested, increasing EGR rates beyond a certain point did not result in decreased knock tendency. 1D Simulation showed that the effectiveness of the EGR is limited by trapped hot residual gasses which resulted in higher in-cylinder temperatures and nullified the cooling effects of the EGR. These results suggest that attention must be paid to reducing backpressure via efficient EGR system architecture design in order to achieve the highest possible efficiency.


2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (34) ◽  
pp. 14423-14428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Deniz Zengel ◽  
Pirmin Koch ◽  
Bentolhoda Torkashvand ◽  
Jan‐Dierk Grunwaldt ◽  
Maria Casapu ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Jinlong Liu ◽  
Cosmin E. Dumitrescu

Increased utilization of natural-gas (NG) in the transportation sector can decrease the use of petroleum-based fuels and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. Heavy-duty diesel engines retrofitted to NG spark ignition (SI) can achieve higher efficiencies and low NOx, CO, and HC emissions when operated under lean-burn conditions. To investigate the SI lean-burn combustion phenomena in a bowl-in-piston combustion chamber, a conventional heavy-duty direct-injection CI engine was converted to SI operation by replacing the fuel injector with a spark plug and by fumigating NG in the intake manifold. Steady-state engine experiments and numerical simulations were performed at several operating conditions that changed spark timing, engine speed, and mixture equivalence ratio. Results suggested a two-zone NG combustion inside the diesel-like combustion chamber. More frequent and significant late burn (including double-peak heat release rate) was observed for advanced spark timing. This was due to the chamber geometry affecting the local flame speed, which resulted in a faster and thicker flame in the bowl but a slower and thinner flame in the squish volume. Good combustion stability (COVIMEP < 3 %), moderate rate of pressure rise, and lack of knocking showed promise for heavy-duty CI engines converted to NG SI operation.


2020 ◽  
pp. 146808742097775
Author(s):  
Ziqing Zhao ◽  
Zhi Wang ◽  
Yunliang Qi ◽  
Kaiyuan Cai ◽  
Fubai Li

To explore a suitable combustion strategy for natural gas engines using jet ignition, lean burn with air dilution, stoichiometric burn with EGR dilution and lean burn with EGR dilution were investigated in a single-cylinder natural gas engine, and the performances of two kinds of jet ignition technology, passive jet ignition (PJI) and active jet ignition (AJI), were compared. In the study of lean burn with air dilution strategy, the results showed that AJI could extend the lean limit of excess air ratio (λ) to 2.1, which was significantly higher than PJI’s 1.6. In addition, the highest indicated thermal efficiency (ITE) of AJI was shown 2% (in absolute value) more than that of PJI. Although a decrease of NOx emission was observed with increasing λ in the air dilution strategy, THC and CO emissions increased. Stoichiometric burn with EGR was proved to be less effective, which can only be applied in a limited operation range and had less flexibility. However, in contrast to the strategy of stoichiometric burn with EGR, the strategy of lean burn with EGR showed a much better applicability, and the highest ITE could achieve 45%, which was even higher than that of lean burn with air dilution. Compared with the most efficient points of lean burn with pure air dilution, the lean burn with EGR dilution could reduce 78% THC under IMEP = 1.2 MPa and 12% CO under IMEP = 0.4 MPa. From an overall view of the combustion and emission performances under both low and high loads, the optimum λ would be from 1.4 to 1.6 for the strategy of lean burn with EGR dilution.


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