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Palm oil is one of the vegetable oil, which is converted to biodiesel through a transesterification process using methanol as the catalyst. Palm oil biodiesel or palm methyl ester (PME) can be used in diesel engines without any modification, and can be blended with conventional diesel to produce different proportions of PME-diesel blend fuels. The physical properties of PME were evaluated experimentally and theoretically. The effect of using neat PME as fuel on engine performance and emissions was evaluated using a commercial four-cylinder four-stroke IDI diesel engine. The experimental results on an engine operated with PME exhibited higher brake specific fuel consumption in comparison with the conventional fuel. With respect to the incylinder pressure and heat release rate, these increased features by over 8.11% and 9.3% with PME compared to conventional diesel. The overall results show that PME surpassed the diesel combustion quality due to its psychochemical properties and higher oxygen content.

Experiments are undertaken to determine the efficiency of an evacuated tube solar collector using water-based Titanium Oxide (TiO2) nanofluid at the Pekan Campus (3˚32’ N, 103˚25’ E), Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, University Malaysia Pahang, for the conversion of solar thermal energy. Malaysia lies in the equatorial zone with an average daily solar insolation of more than 900 W/m², which can reach a maximum of 1200 W/m² for most of the year. Traditionally water is pumped through the collector at an optimum flow rate, for the extraction of solar thermal energy. If the outlet temperature of the water is high, further circulation of the water through the collector is useless. This is due to the low thermal conductivity of water of 0.6 W/m.K compared to metals which is many orders higher. Hence it is necessary to reduce the surface temperature either by pumping water at a higher flow rate or by enhancing the fluid’s properties by the dispersion of nanoparticles. Pumping water at higher flow rates is not advantageous as the overall efficiency of the system is lowered. Liquids in which nanosized particles of metal or their oxides are dispersed in a base liquid such as water are known as 'Nanofluids'. This results in higher values of thermal conductivity compared to the base liquid. The thermal conductivity increases with the concentration and temperature of the nanofluid. The increase in thermal conductivity with temperature is advantageous for application in collectors as the solar insolation varies throughout the day, with a minimum in the morning reaching a maximum at 2.00p.m and reducing thereafter. The efficiency of the collector estimated using a TiO2 nanofluid of 0.3% concentration is about 0.73, compared to water which is about 0.58. The efficiency is enhanced by 16.7% maximum with 30–50nm sized TiO2 nanoparticles dispersed in the water, compared to the system working solely with water. The flow rate is fixed at 2.7 liters per minute for both liquids.

L. Syam Sundar1 and K.V. Sharma2This paper reports experimental investigations of fully developed laminar convective heat transfer and friction factor characteristics of different volume concentrations of Al2O3 nanofluid in a plain tube, fitted with different twist ratios of twisted tape inserts. Experiments are conducted with water and nanofluid in the range of 700

A mathematical model was developed for the study of external turbulent film condensation of pure vapours flowing downward and normal to the axis of the condenser tube with constant heat flux conditions maintained at the tube wall. The magnitude of interfacial shear was estimated for a given external flow condition of the vapour with the help of Colburn’s analogy. The average condensation heat transfer coefficients for different system conditions were evaluated. The present theory was compared with the available experimental and theoretical data in the literature and was found to be satisfactory.

The forced convection heat transfer coefficient and friction factor are determined for the flow of water and nanofluid in a vertical packed bed column. The analysis is undertaken in the laminar and transition Reynolds number range. The column is filled with spherical glass beads as the bed material. The heat transfer coefficients with Al2O3 nanofluid increased by 12% to 15% with the increase of volume concentration from 0.02% to 0.5% compared with water. The experimental values of axial temperature are in good agreement with the NTU-ε method proposed by Schumann’s model.