The synthesis of 5-(hydroxymethyl)furfural (HMF) and conversion to the corresponding HMF-monoesters upon certain treatment are presented with their properties that are validated in a diesel engine. With a collection of fatty acids (C8-C18) using cyanuric acid as a catalyst under mild reaction conditions, the subsequent reduction of the HMF-monoesters with NaBH4 produced the corresponding alcohols. After purification, both HMF-monoesters and their alcohol derivatives were determined for their solubility, cetane index, heat of combustion, viscosity, and specific gravity. HMF-Capric (1-C10), HMF-Oleic (1-C18:1), HMF-Caprylic-OH (2-C8), and HMF-Oleic-OH (2-C18:1) were soluble in a neat diesel fuel. The observed highest cetane index and heat of combustion of 1-C10 and 1-C18:1 were evaluated for combustion characteristics in a single-cylinder compression ignition engine. The diesel fuel containing 3% 1-C10 displayed comparable properties during burning in terms of thermal efficiency, cylinder pressure, and heat release rate with respect to the neat diesel fuel (D100) for all usage engine speeds. In general, all tested fuels initiated their burning onset with a similar ignition delay period. The 3% 1-C10-blended diesel fuel emitted slightly higher smoke opacity but an equivalent nitric oxide level compared to those of D100. The HMF-Capric (1-C10) synthesized in this study represents a promising additive for diesel fuel. Blended fuel lubricity and other unregulated emissions upon broader engine test cycles are suggested to be accomplished in future work.

This study investigates the feasibility of using Acetone-Butanol-Ethanol mixture (ABE) as a function of the volumetric ratios (20%v, 30%v, 40%v, 50%v blended with n-dodecane) in order to determine the most suitable ABE ratio for CI engines in comparison to a butanol/n-dodecane blend. The “New One Shot Engine” set-up was used to determine the lift-off length (LOL), ignition delay (ID) and soot concentration by means of OH* chemiluminescence and Diffused Back Illumination imaging at an ambient pressure and temperature of 60 bar and 900 K corresponding to ECN Spray-A conditions. It was found that ID and LOL increased, while soot concentration was reduced with the increase in concentration of ABE and Butanol in dodecane blends. The blends with the smallest content (20%) of ABE or Bu exhibited similar combustion characteristics to n-dodecane with a considerable reduction in soot, indicating that these blends can be considered as a Diesel substitute without any engine modifications.

The intermediate product of the butanol production process, acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) mixture, is a promising alternative fuel for diesel engine as its physical properties are resemble to diesel fuel. This study explores heat release pattern and thermal efficiency as a consequence of combustion of the 20% v/v ABE blended with diesel (ABE20) in a stock single-cylinder diesel engine. All parameters were studied in steady-state condition of medium and full loads at a constant engine speed of 1400 rpm. ABE20 presents a slightly lower thermal efficiency with comparable energy consumption compared to diesel fuel. A longer ignition delay was observed for ABE20 and the diffusion combustion regime was shortened in duration. The cylinder pressure-derived heat release in the expansion stroke discloses a different specific heat ratio during ABE20 combustion.

One of the objective of Engine Combustion Network (ECN), (https://ecn.sandia.gov/) is to provide experimental results with high accuracy in order to validate model and reach new steps in scientific understanding of spray combustion at conditions specific to engines. The ECN community defines different target conditions, experimental diagnostics and post processing methods to facilitate the comparison of experimental and simulations studies performed in different facilities or models. In this context two French laboratories propose two new facilities, based on Rapid Compression Machines to reach the ECN spray A conditions. In this paper, the results of liquid and vapour spray penetration as well as Ignition Delay (ID) and Lift-Off Length (LOL) obtained with these Rapid Compression Machines are compared to the results obtained in the Constant Volume Preburn (CVP) vessel of IFPEN. The specificities of each experimental apparatus allow to bring complementary elements of understanding like confinement effects. In non-reactive condition, the liquid and vapour sprays were characterized by Diffused-Back Illumination and Schlieren technique, and in reactive conditions, the LOL and the ID by OH* chemiluminescence. The analysis of the results with regard to the boundary conditions (temperature, velocity, confinement) make it possible to validate these two new facilities and contribute to enhance the database of ECN, highlighting the confinement effect typical of piston engine operation.

The Engine Combustion Network (ECN) community has greatly contributed to improve the fundamental understanding of spray atomization and combustion at conditions relevant to internal combustion engines. In this context, standardized spray experiments have been defined to facilitate the comparison of experimental and simulation studies performed in different facilities and with different models. This operating mode promotes collaborations among research groups and accelerates the advancement of research on spray. In efforts to improve the comparability of the ECN spray A experiments, it is of high importance to review the boundary conditions of different devices used in the community. This work is issued from the collaboration in the ECN France project, where two new experimental facilities from PPRIME (Poitiers) and PRISME (Orleans) institutes are validated to perform spray A experiments. The two facilities, based on Rapid Compression Machine (RCM) design, have been investigated to characterize their boundary conditions (e.g., flow velocity as well as fuel and gas temperatures). A set of standardized spray experiments were performed to compare their results with those obtained in other facilities, in particular the Constant Volume Pre-burn (CVP) vessel at IFPEN . It is noteworthy that it is the first time that RCM type facilities are used in such a way within the ECN. This paper (part 1) focuses on the facilities description and the fine characterization of their boundary conditions. A further paper (part 2) will present the results obtained with the same facilities performing ECN standard spray A characterizations. The reported review of thermocouple thermometry highlights that it is necessary to use thin-wires and bare-bead junction as small as possible. This would help to measure the temperature fluctuations with a minimal need for error corrections, which are highly dependent on the proper estimation of the velocity through the junction, and therefore it may introduce important uncertainties. Temperature heterogeneities are observed in all spray A devices. The standard deviation of the temperature distribution at the time of injection is approximately 5%. We report time-resolved temperature measurement from PPRIME RCM, performed in the near nozzle area during the injection. In inert condition, colder gases from the boundary layer are entrained toward the mixing area of the spray causing a further deviation from the target temperature. This emphasizes the importance of the temperature in the boundary (wall) layer. In reacting condition, the temperature of these entrained gases increases by the effect of the increased pressure, as the RCM has a relatively small volume. Generally, the velocity and turbulence levels are an order of magnitude higher in RCM and constant pressure flow compared to CVP vessels. The boundary characterization presented here will be the base for discussing spray behavior in the part 2 of this paper.

A New One Shot Engine (NOSE) was designed to simulate the thermodynamic conditions at High Pressure-High Temperature like an actual common-rail diesel engine in order to study the compression ignition of spray. The volume of the combustion chamber provided with large optical windows simplified the implementation of various optical diagnostics. The advantage of this kind of set-up in comparison to pre-burn or flue chambers is that the initial gas mixture can be well controlled in terms of species and mole fraction. The purpose of this work was to investigate the impact of nitric oxide (NO) on ignition delay (ID) for two fuels with different cetane numbers: n-heptane, and n-dodecane. In the thermodynamic conditions chosen (60 bar and over 800-900 K), NO had a strong effect on ID, with increases in NO tending to reduce the ignition delay. Results showed that ID and Lift-Off Length (LOL) presented the same trend as a function of temperature and NO concentration. Experimentally, at 900 K the ignition of n-dodecane was promoted by NO up to 100 ppm, whilst higher NO levels did not further promote ignition and a stabilization of the value has been noticed. For n-heptane, stronger promoting effects were observed in the same temperature conditions: the ignition delays were monotonically reduced with up to 200 ppm NO addition. At a lower temperature (800 K) the inhibiting effect was observed for n-dodecane for [NO] greater than 40 ppm, whereas only a promoting effect was observed for n-heptane. The experimental results of LOL showed that NO shortened LOL in almost all cases, and this varied with both the NO concentration and the mixture temperature. Thus, fuels with shorter ignition delays produce shorter lift-off lengths. (C) 2018 The Combustion Institute. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Quantifying liquid mass distribution data in the dense near nozzle area to develop and optimize diesel spray byoptical diagnostic is challenging. Optical methods, while providing valuable information, have intrinsic limitations due to the strong scattering of visible light at gas-liquid boundaries. Because of the high density of the droplets near the nozzle, most optical methods are ineffective in this area and prevent the acquisition of reliable quantitative data. X-ray diagnostics offer a solution to this issue, since the main interaction between the fuel and the X-rays is absorption, rather than scattering, thus X-ray technique offers an appealing alternative to optical techniques for studying fuel sprays. Over the last decade, x-ray radiography experiments have demonstrated the ability to perform quantitative measurements in complex sprays. In the present work, an X-ray technique based on X-ray absorption has been conducted to perform measurements in dodecane fuel spray injected from a single-hole nozzle at high injection pressure and high temperature. The working fluid has been doped with DPX 9 containing a Cerium additive, which acts as a contrast agent. The first step of this work was to address the effect of this dopant, which increases the sensitivity of X-ray diagnostics due its strong photon absorption, on the behavior and the physical characteristics of n-dodecane spray. Comparisons of the diffused back illumination images acquired from n- dodecane spray with and without DPX 9 under similar operating conditions show several significant differences. The current data show clearly that the liquid penetration length is different when DPX 9 is mixed with dodecane. To address this problem, the dodecane was doped with a several quantities of DPX containing 25% ± 0.5 of Cerium. Experiments show that 1.25% of Ce doesn’t affect the behaviour of spray. Radiography and density measurements at ambient pressure and 60 bars are presented. Spray cone angle around 5° is obtained. The obtained data shows that the result is a compromise between the concentration of dopant for which the physical characteristics of thespray do not change and the visualization of the jet by X-ray for this concentration.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4995/ILASS2017.2017.4705

The intermediate fermentation mixture of butanol production, Acetone, Butanol and Ethanol (ABE), is increasinglyconsidered as a new alternative fuel in CI engines due to its physical and chemical properties, which are similar to those of butanol, and its advantages of no additional cost or energy consumption due to butanol separation. In a previous study, the High-Pressure and High-Temperature (HPHT) chamber, called ‘New One Shot Engine” (NOSE), was used to investigate macroscopic spray-combustion parameters by validating Spray-A conditions of the Engine Combustion Network. The present study concerns the spray-combustion characteristics of the ABE mixture (volume ratio 3:6:1), blended with n-dodecane at a volumetric ratio of 20% (ABE20), compared to n-dodecane as reference fuel. The macroscopic spray and combustion parameters were investigated, for non-reactive conditions, in pure Nitrogen and for reactive conditions, in 15% oxygen, at ambient pressure (60 bar), ambient density (22.8 kg/m3) and different ambient temperatures (800 K, 850 K and 900 K). The liquid and vapor spray penetrations were investigated by the Diffused Back Illumination (DBI) and Schlieren techniques in non-reactive conditions. In reactive conditions, the lift-off length was measured by OH* chemiluminescence images at 310 nm. The Schlieren technique was also used to verify the choice of detection criterion. The ignition delay results of the two fuels were compared. It was found that the behavior of the two fuels as a function of temperature was similar even if the liquid length of ABE20 was shorter than that of n-dodecane at all ambient temperatures. On the other hand, no real difference in vapor spray penetration between the two fuels was observed. The vaporization properties and the lower auto-ignition ability of ABE20 led to longer ignition delays and lift-off length.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4995/ILASS2017.2017.4852