Spray combustion invetigation through optical techniques in a prototype compression ignition engine fuelled with n-butanol-diesel blends

The increasing energy demand from emerging countries and the simultaneous fossil oil shortage promote the use of alternative fuels. Even if gasoline and diesel continue to dominate automotive market, the use of non-conventional fuels such as biodiesel or al¬cohols is growing. Exhaust emissions and performance of compression ignition engines fuelled with diesel-alcohol fuel blends have been widely investigated. On the other hand, a deeper understanding of in-cylinder combustion is necessary as the different chemical physical properties of alcohols, such as oxygen content, volatility and cetane number affect the ignition, combustion mechanism and the pollutants formation. This work reports results of cycle resolved visualization and UV-visible optical imaging, carried out in an optically accessible compression ignition engine. Two different blends of diesel and n-butanol were tested: 20% and 40% of n-butanol by volume. The effect of n-bu¬tanol concentration on flame lift-off length and soot formation was investigated. Exhaust Gas Recirculation (O2 at intake 17%) was used for further reducing the local temperature peak. The combined effect of EGR and high oxygen content of n-butanol/diesel blends induced a simultaneous reduction of both NOx and soot emission. The correlation of optical measurements with thermodynamic and exhaust emission analysis allowed to emphasize the role of n-butanol oxygen content in the soot oxidation process.