Modeling the Liquid Properties of E10 Gasoline for Application in Hydraulic and Combustion System Simulations at High Injection Pressures – Validation With Experimental Measurements

Abstract Gasoline compression ignition (GCI) is an internal combustion engine technology that can improve the soot-NOx tradeoff and CO2 emissions of conventional diesel powertrains. GCI also offers a pathway to alleviate the operational and durability demands being placed on current lean aftertreatment systems for meeting upcoming criteria pollutant regulations. High-pressure fuel injection equipment is a key enabling subsystem for GCI and optimization along with the combustion, air and aftertreatment systems requires the use of simulation-based design tools like 1D hydraulic models or 3D-CFD. However, these tools require fuel property specifications to accurately capture the flow, spray, and combustion processes at conditions relevant to GCI. This work presents a surrogate formulation methodology that matches the entire measured chemical species listing of any gasoline as closely as possible and generates the required fuel properties over a specified range. It can be used when direct determination is not feasible or when properties are unknown at every condition of interest. Measurements of liquid density, viscosity, heat capacity and thermal conductivity were conducted on E10 certification gasoline from −20 to 150°C and 0–2500 bar (g) to validate the calculation methodology. Density did not exceed 1.6% difference with measured data, while heat capacity remained within 27%. Viscosity and thermal conductivity had maximum errors of 173% and 46%, respectively. This was due to the lack of appropriate pressure dependencies for these properties in the calculation methodology. The maximum error in modeled viscosity was reduced to 53% after employing a simple viscosity-pressure correlation for generic hydrocarbons.