Effect of piston bowl geometry on combustion, performance, and emission characteristics of a dual-fuel engine

  • Abdullah Al Rifat Department of Mechanical Engineering, Chittagong University of Engineering and Technology, Chittagong-4349, Bangladesh
  • Md. Mizanur Rahman Department of Mechanical Engineering, Chittagong University of Engineering and Technology, Chittagong-4349, Bangladesh
  • Md. Arafat Rahman Department of Mechanical Engineering, Chittagong University of Engineering and Technology, Chittagong-4349, Bangladesh
DOI https://doi.org/10.55670/fpll.fuen.5.1.1
2938 Abstract Views 1120 Downloads
Abstract

The piston bowl shape plays a crucial role in turbulence, swirl, and subsequent fuel-air mixing, which in turn affect combustion, emissions, and performance attributes. A cylinder stepped and modified re-entrant combustion chamber was investigated through Ansys Forte 2023 R1 CFD software to analyze combustion, emission, and performance characteristics in a diesel-methane dual-fuel engine. Numerical investigation is performed under 0.44 MPa load, 50% methane energy contribution, 7° start of injection bTDC, and with a 120° spray angle. Methane is injected into the inlet manifold to be premixed with air. The maximum thermal efficiency was found to be 34.11%, and a specific fuel consumption of 270.44 g/kW-h was indicated by the modified re-entrant bowl shape. The combustion duration for a modified re-entrant is 6.73% and 14.38% higher than that of a cylinder and stepped bowl. Higher combustion efficiency, combustion duration, and total apparent heat release demonstrate sustained combustion in the modified re-entrant bowl. Strong early premixed combustion in a cylinder-shaped bowl gives the highest percentage of NOx. The stepped bowl has fuel-rich zones near the center after 19° CA, with lower temperatures near the center, giving higher amounts of UHC and VOC emissions. The amount of O and OH radical formation in the modified re-entrant bowl was lower, and delayed oxidation resulted in a higher amount of CO emission. The modified re-entrant bowl offered the best combustion, performance, and emission attributes among the bowl shapes.

Graphical Abstract
Keywords
Piston bowl Dual-fuel Engine Energy share Combustion and emission
How to Cite
Al Rifat, Abdullah, Md. Mizanur Rahman, and Md. Arafat Rahman. 2025. “Effect of Piston Bowl Geometry on Combustion, Performance, and Emission Characteristics of a Dual-Fuel Engine”. Future Energy 5 (1):1-9. https://doi.org/10.55670/fpll.fuen.5.1.1.
References
  1. H. Topkaya, M.Z. Işık, Y. Çelebi, H. Aydın, Numerical analysis of various combustion chamber bowl geometries on combustion, performance, and emissions parameters in a diesel engine, Int. J. Automot. Eng. Technol. 13 (2024) 63–72.
  2. İ. Temizer, Ö. Cihan, Ö. Öncüoğlu, Numerical investigation of different combustion chamber on flow, combustion characteristics and exhaust emissions, Eur. Mech. Sci. 7 (2023) 7–15.
  3. B. Challen, R. Baranescu, Diesel engine reference book, (No Title) (1999).
  4. R.M. Montajir, H. Tsunemoto, H. Ishitani, T. Minami, Fuel spray behavior in a small DI diesel engine: effect of combustion chamber geometry, SAE Technical Paper, 2000. https://doi.org/10.4271/2000-01-0946
  5. P. Prabhakaran, C.G. Saravanan, R. Vallinayagam, M. Vikneswaran, N. Muthukumaran, K. Ashok, Investigation of swirl induced piston on the engine characteristics of a biodiesel fueled diesel engine, Fuel 279 (2020) 118503.
  6. I.H. Rizvi, R. Gupta, Numerical investigation of injection parameters and piston bowl geometries on emission and thermal performance of DI diesel engine, SN Appl. Sci. 3 (2021) 626.
  7. X. Wang, H. Zhao, Effect of piston shape design on the scavenging performance and mixture preparation in a two-stroke boosted uniflow scavenged direct injection gasoline engine, Int. J. Engine Res. 22 (2021) 1484–1499.
  8. O. Adeniyi, Numerical investigation on the effect of piston bowl geometry on combustion characteristics of a heavy-duty diesel engine, Mapta J. Mech. Ind. Eng. 3 (2019) 9–20.
  9. G. Mittal, M. Subhash, M. Gwalwanshi, Effect of initial turbulence on combustion with ECFM-3Z model in a CI engine, Mater. Today Proc. 46 (2021) 11007–11010.
  10. H.E. Gulcan, M. Ciniviz, Experimental study on the effect of piston bowl geometry on the combustion performance and pollutant emissions of methane-diesel common rail dual-fuel engine, Fuel 345 (2023) 128175.
  11. J. V Pastor, A. García, C. Micó, F. Lewiski, A. Vassallo, F.C. Pesce, Effect of a novel piston geometry on the combustion process of a light-duty compression ignition engine: An optical analysis, Energy 221 (2021) 119764.
  12. C.P.A. Gafoor, R. Gupta, Numerical investigation of piston bowl geometry and swirl ratio on emission from diesel engines, Energy Convers. Manag. 101 (2015) 541–551.
  13. J.B. Heywood, Internal combustion engine fundamentals, McGraw-Hill Education, 2018.
  14. R. Sener, M.U. Yangaz, M.Z. Gul, Effects of injection strategy and combustion chamber modification on a single-cylinder diesel engine, Fuel 266 (2020) 117122.
  15. P. Dimitriou, W. Wang, Z. Peng, A piston geometry and nozzle spray angle investigation in a DI diesel engine by quantifying the air-fuel mixture, Int. J. Spray Combust. Dyn. 7 (2015) 1–24.
  16. J. Zhao, R. Yang, Y. Yan, J. Ou, Z. Liu, J. Liu, Numerical study on the effect of injector nozzle hole number on diesel engine performance under plateau conditions, SAE Technical Paper, 2023.
  17. A.-H. Kakaee, A. Nasiri-Toosi, B. Partovi, A. Paykani, Effects of piston bowl geometry on combustion and emissions characteristics of a natural gas/diesel RCCI engine, Appl. Therm. Eng. 102 (2016) 1462–1472.
  18. P. Singh, S.K. Tiwari, R. Singh, N. Kumar, Modification in combustion chamber geometry of CI engines for suitability of biodiesel: A review, Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 79 (2017) 1016–1033.
  19. D. Hariharan, M. Rahimi Boldaji, Z. Yan, B. Gainey, B. Lawler, Exploring the effects of piston bowl geometry and injector included angle on dual-fuel and single-fuel RCCI, J. Eng. Gas Turbines Power 143 (2021) 111013.
  20. T. Saito, Y. Daisho, N. Uchida, N. Ikeya, Effects of combustion chamber geometry on diesel combustion, SAE Trans. (1986) 793–803.
  21. V.S. Yaliwal, N.R. Banapurmath, N.M. Gireesh, R.S. Hosmath, T. Donateo, P.G. Tewari, Effect of nozzle and combustion chamber geometry on the performance of a diesel engine operated on dual fuel mode using renewable fuels, Renew. Energy 93 (2016) 483–501.
  22. A.B. Dempsey, N.R. Walker, R. Reitz, Effect of piston bowl geometry on dual fuel reactivity controlled compression ignition (RCCI) in a light-duty engine operated with gasoline/diesel and methanol/diesel, SAE Int. J. Engines 6 (2013) 78–100.
  23. B.R.R. Bapu, L. Saravanakumar, B.D. Prasad, Effects of combustion chamber geometry on combustion characteristics of a DI diesel engine fueled with calophyllum inophyllum methyl ester, J. Energy Inst. 90 (2017) 82–100.
  24. V.C. Pham, J.K. Kim, W.-J. Lee, S.-J. Choe, V.V. Le, J.-H. Choi, Effects of Piston Bowl Geometry on Combustion and Emissions of a Four-Stroke Heavy-Duty Diesel Marine Engine, Appl. Sci. 12 (2022) 13012.
  25. R. Mobasheri, Z. Peng, Analysis of the effect of re-entrant combustion chamber geometry on combustion process and emission formation in a HSDI diesel engine, SAE Technical Paper, 2012.
  26. W.P. Adamczyk, G. Kruczek, R. Bialecki, G. Przybyła, Application of different numerical models capable to simulate combustion of alternative fuels in internal combustion engine, Int. J. Numer. Methods Heat Fluid Flow 30 (2020) 2517–2534.
  27. K.M. Rahman, Z. Ahmed, Combustion and emission characteristics of a diesel engine operating with varying equivalence ratio and compression ratio-A CFD simulation, J. Eng. Adv. 1 (2020) 101–110.
  28. O. Zikanov, Essential computational fluid dynamics, John Wiley & Sons, 2019. ISBN-13: 978-1119474623
  29. B. Sun, Revisiting the reynolds-averaged navier–stokes equations, Open Phys. 19 (2022) 853–862.
  30. O.H. Ghazal, Air pollution reduction and environment protection using methane fuel for turbocharged CI engines, J. Ecol. Eng. 19 (2018) 52–58.
  31. G. Tripathi, P. Sharma, A. Dhar, Effect of methane augmentations on engine performance and emissions, Alexandria Eng. J. 59 (2020) 429–439.
  32. H.J. Curran, P. Gaffuri, W.J. Pitz, C.K. Westbrook, A Comprehensive Modeling Study of n-Heptane Oxidation, Combust. Flame 114 (1998) 149–177. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/S0010-2180(97)00282-4.
  33. Z. Smith, G. P.; Golden, D. M.; Frenklach, M.; Moriarty, N. W.; Eiteneer, B.; Goldenberg, M.; Bowman, C. T.; Hanson, R. K.; Song, S.; Gardiner, W. C. Jr.; Lissianski, V. V.; Qin, GRI-Mech 3.0, Univ. California, Berkeley (1999). http://www.me.berkeley.edu/gri_mech/.
  34. M.P.B. Musculus, On the correlation between NOx emissions and the diesel premixed burn, SAE Trans. (2004) 631–651.
  35. S.M. Farhan, P. Wang, Post-injection strategies for performance improvement and emissions reduction in DI diesel engines—A review, Fuel Process. Technol. 228 (2022) 107145. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2021.107145.
  36. C. Deheri, S.K. Acharya, D.N. Thatoi, A.P. Mohanty, A review on performance of biogas and hydrogen on diesel engine in dual fuel mode, Fuel 260 (2020) 116337. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2019.116337.
  37. Y. Sun, Y. Zhang, M. Huang, Q. Li, W. Wang, D. Zhao, S. Cheng, H. Deng, J. Du, Y. Song, Effect of hydrogen addition on the combustion and emission characteristics of methane under gas turbine relevant operating condition, Fuel 324 (2022) 124707.
  38. G. Tripathi, A. Dhar, Performance, emissions, and combustion characteristics of methane-diesel dual-fuel engines: A review, Front. Therm. Eng. 2 (2022) 870077.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.