Results of Binary Blends of VO and Diesel
5.2 Performance Analysis
The performance of the engine is analyzed on the basis of BTE, BSFC and EGT of the engine. Both BTE and BSFC are evaluated considering the mass flow rate of fuel that is
consumed at each load the engine, while EGT is recorded from the digital display unit. The BSFC of engine with VO blends follow a trend that is similar to the diesel with decreasing value with the increase in the engine load as shown in Figure 5.1. However, higher the amount of Mesua ferrea Linn oil in the blend, the BSFC of the engine becomes higher. The increase in BSFC with blend as compared to diesel is in the range of 3 to 7% with the use of VO20, while it is even more with the use of VO30 in the range of 5 to 11%. This difference is wider with the increasing power output. The VO10 is showing very little difference with that of the diesel. The increase in BSFC with increment in the percentage of VO in the blend has also been reported in the investigations of Pramanik (2003), Hebbal et al. (2006), Rakopoulos et al. (2006), Agarwal and Agarwal (2007), Bajpai et al. (2009), Rakopoulos et al. (2011), and Qi et al. (2014). This increase in BSFC with the use of VO is due to the lower calorific value of VO. The lower caloric value necessitates the addition of extra fuel to produce a unit power output similar to that of diesel. The higher BSFC of VO blend also results in inducting a richer air fuel mixture into the engine cylinder as compared to that of diesel. The higher is the content of VO in the blends, the richer is the air fuel ratio as depicted in Figure 5.2. The air fuel ratio richer up to 3.2 and 4.7% with the use of VO20 and VO30, respectively.
However, the VO10 exhibits a similar trend to that of the diesel except at the lower load. At the load of 20 and 40%, VO10 shows lower equivalence ratio as compared to diesel. The vegetable oil being an oxygenated fuel may have contributed additional oxygen for the combustion.
Figure 5.1 Variation of BSFC with the engine load.
Figure 5.2 Variation of equivalence ratio with the engine load.
The variation of BTE with the engine load for diesel, VO10, VO20 and VO30 are illustrated in Figure 5.3. It increases with the increase in the engine load for all the test fuels. In general, the blending results in the reduction of engine BTE. This reduction increases with the increase in the volume of Mesua ferrea Linn oil in the blend. On an average, the reduction in BTE is 1.5, 3.1 and 4.4% with maximum of 1.8, 3.9 and 5.5% for VO10, VO20 and VO30, respectively. The difference in reduction increases with the increasing engine load. The VO has higher viscosity and lower volatility than the diesel which leads to poor combustion characteristics and a reduction in BTE (Pramanik 2003; Hebbal et al. 2006; Devan and Mahalakshmi 2009; Chauhan et al. 2010; Shah and Ganesh 2016). The higher viscosity results in the formation of larger fuel droplets in the fuel spray leading to inadequate mixing of air and fuel droplets (Agarwal and Rajamanoharan 2009; Singh 2013). The low volatility affects the spray formation inside the combustion chamber resulting in slow combustion (Hebbal et al. 2006). Moreover, the higher amount of VO in the blend results in the richer air fuel mixture affecting the combustion process. The VO10 blend shows a comparable performance to that of diesel. At intermediate and lower engine loads, it is slightly better with VO10. Similar typical results of VO blend have been reported in the investigations of Rakopoulos et al. (2006), Bajpai et al. (2009) and Rakopoulos et al. (2011). Bajpai et al.
(2009) assumes that the better combustion and additional lubricity with VO blend results in this improvement.
Figure 5.3 Variation of BTE with the engine load.
The blends VO10 and VO20 have registered lower EGT as compared to diesel throughout the operating range of the engine as revealed in Figure 5.4. It tends to increase with the increase in the amount of Mesua ferrea Linn oil in the blend. At the 100% engine load, EGT is found to be 344, 353 and 357 °C for VO10, VO20 and VO30, respectively; while diesel has shown the engine EGT to be 359 °C. While using the neat VO in the engine, in most of the studies, it has been found that the EGT is relatively higher than that of diesel (Pramanik 2003; Hebbal et al. 2006; Agarwal and Agarwal 2007; Agarwal and Rajamanoharan 2009; Devan and Mahalakshmi 2009). This may be attributed to the presence of higher boiling point components of the VO which do not sufficiently evaporate during the main combustion phase and continues to burn in the later phase of the combustion (Devan and Mahalakshmi 2009).
The volumetric efficiency at different load for the test fuels are presented in Figure 5.5.
Generally, it decreases with the increasing load. With the increasing load due to the higher pressure of residual gas some part of the suction stroke is utilized in re-expansion of this gas thereby reducing the amount of fresh air inducted. There is a slight drop in the volumetric efficiency with blended fuels.
Figure 5.4 Variation of EGT with the engine load.
Figure 5.5 Variation of volumetric efficiency with the engine load.