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Combined in-cylinder and after-treatment emission control methods are generally adopted to meet the current stringent emission targets for diesel engines. It is well established that reducing the geometric compression ratio (CR) results in a simultaneous reduction in the oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and soot emissions in diesel engines. However, poor cold-start characteristics prevent extensive use of low compression ratio (LCR) diesel engines for automotive applications. In the present work, a novel extremely delayed intake valve opening (IVO) strategy is proposed to improve the cold-start characteristics of a light-duty LCR diesel engine. A commercial one-dimensional gas-exchange model was used to optimize the intake valve open and close timings. The results corresponding to a cranking speed of 200 rpm and ambient temperature of 0°C show that advancing the intake valve close (IVC) timing increases the effective compression stroke that can improve the cylinder temperature by 5%. Further, implementing ‘extremely delayed IVO’ by retarding the timing from 1°CA to 61°CA aTDC could help to further increase the cylinder temperature by 14% compared to the base timings. The delayed opening of the intake valve leads to a higher expansion of the cylinder mass, leading to a lower cylinder pressure before IVO and a higher intake air velocity immediately after IVO. With the higher intake air velocity, the incoming air’s kinetic energy is dissipated to increase the stagnation temperature, resulting in an overall benefit in cylinder temperature. The experimental measurements conducted in a cold chamber with the optimized IVO and IVC timings confirmed the benefits by achieving a better cold-startability of the LCR engine. In comparison, the LCR engine with the stock valve timings could be started only up to +5°C, the optimized valve timings could ensure startability up to −10°C without any starting aids. Thus, the proposed approach of adopting the optimized valve timings can help LCR diesel engines to overcome the limitations of cold-startability.

Exhaust after-treatment (EAT) systems on automotive vehicles cannot perform effectively at low loads due to low exhaust temperatures (Texhaust < 250oC). Con-ventional late intake valve closure (LIVC) technique - a proven method to im-prove diesel exhaust temperatures - generally requires the modulation of the whole valve lift profile. However, an alternative method - boot-shaped LIVC - only needs partial lift form modulation and can rise exhaust temperatures signif-icantly. Therefore, this study attempts to demonstrate that boot-shaped LIVC can be an alternative solution to improve exhaust temperatures above 250oC at low-loaded operations of automotive vehicles.A 1-D engine simulation program is used to model the diesel engine system operating at 1200 RPM engine speed and at 2.5 bar brake mean effective pres-sure (BMEP) engine load. Boot-shaped LIVC is achieved via keeping the valve lift constant (at 4.0 mm) for a while during closure and then closing it at different closure angles. The method results in up to 55oC exhaust temperature rise through reduced in-cylinder airflow and thus, is adequate to keep EAT system above 250oC at low loads. The longer the boot is kept during closure, the lower the air-to-fuel ratio is reduced and the higher the exhaust temperature flows at turbine exit. Similar to conventional LIVC, boot-shaped LIVC improves fuel con-sumption as pumping losses are decreased in the system. Despite aforementioned improvements, EAT warm-up is affected negatively due to the significant drop-off on exhaust mass flow rates. The need to modify only some parts of the lift profile is a technical advantage and can reduce production costs.

A comprehensive analysis of the intake valve opening duration (IVOD) effects on the performance of an Atkinson cycle engine is conducted in this work using numerical simulation and experimental validation. Through one-dimensional simulation, the relationship between the range of IVOD and the compression ratios is firstly investigated under the constraint of compression pressure. Two representative IVOD, 295 and 314°CA, are then respectively applied to the performance simulation and experiment of a practical Atkinson cycle engine. The simulation shows the combination of a late intake valve opening timing (IVO) angle and a late exhaust valve opening timing (EVO) angle is profitable for improving the fuel economy under part load operating conditions (i.e. 2000 rpm@2 bar and 3000 rpm@3 bar). The experimental results present the Atkinson cycle engine under both IVOD scenarios considerably improves the brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and reduces the pumping mean effective pressure (PMEP) compared to those of the original Otto cycle engine. Meanwhile, the comparison between two IVOD scenarios show that the shorter IVOD leads to an improvement of indicated thermal efficiency, especially at lower load. Considering fuel economy, a shorter IVOD is more favorable at part load for the Atkinson cycle engine. Two main contributions of this work are to numerically quantify the IVOD range for the Atkinson cycle engine under part load, and to experimentally validate the effectiveness of simulation. The findings of this work are expected to support the design of Atkinson cycle engines and provide a guideline of IVOD optimization under part load.

Dimethyl Ether (DME) is a possible clean substitute to diesel for CI engines. A computational study was done to understand the influence of time of injection on performance and emissions from a DME based CI engine. Due to the symmetry of the engine, the simulations were conducted on a 60 o sector of the cylinder from closure of intake valve to opening of exhaust valve. The start of fuel injection (SOI) time was varied from - 25 o b T D C to - 2 o b T D C . Simulated results for pressure traces, heat release rates, IMEP, and CO and NO emissions are presented. Maximum IMEP was obtained for SOI of - 2 o b T D C , and it decreased with advanced injection. The decrease was small up to advance of - 10 o b T D C . NO emissions peaked around SOI of - 10 o b T D C to - 15 o b T D C . In contrast, CO emissions showed an opposite trend.

This paper experimentally and numerically studied the effects of fuel combination and intake valve opening (IVO) timing on combustion and emissions of an n-heptane and gasoline dual-fuel homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI) engine. By changing the gasoline fraction (GF) from 0.1 to 0.5 and the IVO timing from −15°CA ATDC to 35°CA ATDC, the in-cylinder pressure traces, heat release behaviors, and HC and CO emissions were investigated. The results showed that both the increased GF and the retarded IVO timing delay the combustion phasing, lengthen the combustion duration, and decrease the peak heat release rate and the maximum average combustion temperature, whereas the IVO timing has a more obvious influence on combustion than GF. HC and CO emissions are decreased with reduced GF, advanced IVO timing and increased operational load.

The article provides the study on causes of damage to ICE intake valves, in the course of which the intake valve heads have been overheated and deformed as a result of material creep. On the example of the failure detected in the analysed engine, it has been established that the traditionally known reasons such as the combustion process failure cannot cause the damage described. For the purpose of determining the real causes of damage to the intake valves the authors simulated the thermal state of the intake valve in the heatingcooling conditions with the impact of gas in the cylinder and the impact of air in the intake pipe as well as the contact heat exchange with the seat with regard to thermal conductivity along the stem. The calculations have shown that with the increase of rotation frequency the failure of the control system that causes the engine to run at high rotation frequencies with a small intake valve lift leads to the temperature increase higher than it is recommended for the materials used, which causes the described overheating. Based on the conducted research the authors have developed recommendations for improving the reliability of the intake valves performance in the ICEs with variable valve timing.

Given the wide application of hybrid engines, how to improve hybrid engine fuel economy is being more and more studied, and using the Atkinson cycle to improve fuel economy is considered effective. In this study, the in-cylinder direct injection engine model was established with the data obtained from a benchmarking test using the GT-POWER simulation software. The working process of this engine was simulated after using Atkinson cycle. This simulation primarily focused on the research of the impact on engine fuel economy with different late intake valve closing strategies. The simulation results were calculated under the partial load conditions which are typically used in hybrid engines. The results indicated that engine fuel economy improved and fuel consumption decreased by using the Atkinson cycle. However, the Atkinson cycle would cause a decrease in power.