• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.45-56
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• 2001

A constant volume combustion chamber is employed to investigate the initial flame kernel development and flame propagation of gasoline-air mixtures with various ignition systems, ignition energy and spark plug electrodes. To do this research, four ignition systems are designed and manufactured, and the ignition energy is controlled by varying the dwell time. Several kinds of spark plugs are also made to analyze the effects of electrodes on flame kernel development. The velocity of flame propagation is measured by the laser deflection method. The output laser beam from He-Ne laser is divided into three parallel beams by a beam splitter. The splitted beams pass through the combustion chamber. They are deflected when contacted with flame front, and the voltage signals from photodiodes change due to deflection. The results show that higher ignition energy raises the flame propagation speed especially under the fuel lean operation. The wider electrode gap, smaller electrode diameter and sharper electrode tip make the speed of the initial flame propagation faster. The speed of the initial flame propagation is affected by electrode material as well. Electrode material with lower melting temperature help the initial flame propagation.

• International Journal of Automotive Technology
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.17-23
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• 2006

An experimental study was carried out to obtain the fundamental data about the effect of sub-chamber on pre-mixture combustion. A eve (constant volume combustor) divided into a sub-chamber and a main chamber was used in this experiment. The volume of the sub-chamber was varid trom $0.45\%$ to $1.4\%$ about the whole combustion chamber. The sub-chamber has twelve narrow radial passage holes and a spark plug to ignite the pre-mixture. As the ignition occurs in the sub-chamber by a spark discharge, burned and unburned gas including a great number of radicals is injected into the main chamber, then the multi-point ignition occurs in the main chamber. The combustion pressure is measured to calculate the burning velocity mainly as a function of the sub-chamber volume, the diameter of the passage holes, and the equivalence ratio. In the case of RI (radical ignition) methods, the overall burning time became very short and the maximum burning pressure was slightly increased as compared with that of SI (spark ignition) method. The optimum design value of the sub-chamber is near 0.11 $cm^{-l}$ in the ratio of total area of holes to the sub-chamber volume.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.125-134
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• 2015

This is the third paper on the combustion characteristics of the landfill gas in a constant volume combustion chamber for a large displacement volume commercial engine. It is the first in this series to discuss the effects of the torch device on combustion. The results show that an optimum orifice ratio exists regardless of the torch volume, and a few adverse effects on the combustion are observed for an excessively small orifice ratio. In addition, the torch ignition decreases the initial burn duration, and the decrease in the heat transfer caused by this decreased duration contributes to an increase in the peak combustion pressure. Finally, the torch mostly plays a positive role in shortening the main burn duration when the combustion condition is worsened by a lower methane fraction. Yet, the torch decreases the initial burn duration rather than the main burn as the methane fraction increases.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.227-235
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• 2012

Finding an alternative fuel and reducing environmental pollution are the main goals for future internal combustion engines. The purpose of this study is to obtain low-emission and high-efficiency by hydrogen enriched LPG fuel in constant volume chamber. An experimental study was carried out to obtain fundamental data for the combustion and emission characteristics of pre-mixed hydrogen and LPG in a constant volume chamber (CVC) with various fractions of hydrogen-LPG blends. To maintain equal heating value of fuel blend, the amount of LPG was decreased as hydrogen was gradually added. Exhaust emissions were measured using a HORIBA exhaust gas analyzer for various fractions of hydrogen-LPG blends. The results showed that the rapid combustion duration was shortened, and the rate of heat release elevated as the hydrogen fraction in the fuel blend was increased. Moreover, the maximum rate of pressure rise also increased. These phenomena were attributed to the burning velocity which increased exponentially with the increased hydrogen fraction in the $H_2$-LPG fuel blend. Exhaust HC and $CO_2$ concentrations decreased, while NOX emission increased with an increase in the hydrogen fraction in the fuel blend. Our results could facilitate the application of hydrogen and LPG as a fuel in the current fossil hydrocarbon-based economy and the strict emission regulations in internal combustion engines.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.593-602
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• 1999

This paper presents combustion characteristics of LPG-air mixture ignited by the plasma jet in a cylindrical vessel with constant volume, in which our focus is placed on the multi-hole plug configuration. Four types of the plug configuration depending on the number of orifice and the arranged angle are considered, along with two cases of conventional spark ignition for comparison. Not only the flame propagation is photographed at intervals, but the pressure in the combustion chamber is also recorded through the entire combustion process. The results show that the plasma jet ignition enhances the overall combustion rate remarkably in comparison to the spark ignition by generating irregular flame front and penetrating through the unburned mixture. The combustion enhancement rate agrees favorably with the available data, which supports the validity of our experiment. Synthetically estimating, the two-hole sixty-degree plug appears to be the most desirable, in that the maximum pressure as well as the combustion duration is less affected by the sub-energy level than the others. It is also deduced that there may exist an optimal plug configuration capable of rapid combustion for a specific combustion chamber.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.14-21
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• 2008

Synthetic gas is defined as reformed gas from hydrocarbon-based fuel and the major chemical species of the synthetic gas are $H_2$, CO and $N_2$. Among them, hydrogen from synthetic gas is very useful species in chemical process such as combustion. It is a main reason that many studies have been performed to develop an effective reforming device. Furthermore, other technologies have been studied for synthetic gas application, such as the ESGI(Exhaust Synthetic Gas Injection) technology. ESGI injects and burns synthetic gas in the exhaust pipe so that heat from hydrogen combustion helps fast warmup of the close-coupled catalyst and reduction of harmful emissions. However, it is very hard to understand combustion characteristic of hydrogen under low oxygen environment and complicated variation in chemical species in exhaust gas. This study focuses on the characteristics of hydrogen combustion under ESGI operating conditions using a CVC(Constant Volume Chamber). Measurements of pressure variation and flame speed have been performed for various oxygen and hydrogen concentrations. Results have been analyzed to understand ignition and combustion characteristics of hydrogen under lower oxygen conditions. The CVC experiments showed that under lower oxygen concentration, amount of active chemicals in the combustion chamber was a crucial factor to influence hydrogen combustion as well as hydrogen/oxygen ratio. It is also found that increase in volume fraction of oxygen is effective for the fast and stable burning of hydrogen by virtue of increase in flame speed.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.629-634
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• 2010

Natural gas is a promising alternative fuel that can be used to satisfy the strict engine emission regulations in many countries. To develop natural-gas engines, low emission, efficient fuel consumption, and increased power ratings have to be realized. In this study, a cylindrical constant-volume combustion chamber (CVCC) was used to investigate natural-gas combustion characteristics for different prechamber design parameters and equivalence ratios. In particular, the maximum combustion pressure and mass fraction of the burned gas were evaluated by considering orifice diameter, volume ratio of prechamber and equivalence ratio. Using this result and by analyzing the changes in combustion characteristics with variations in design parameters, the optimum prechamber parameters were determined.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.86-96
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• 2007

A direct-injection stratified-charge(DISC) engine has been considered as a promising alternative in spite of high unburned hydrocarbon emission levels during light load operation. In this paper investigation is made to characterize formation and combustion processes of stratified mixture charge in a simple constant volume combustion chamber. Both experimental and numerical analyses are performed for fluid and combustion characteristics with 3 different induction types for rich, homogeneous and lean mixture conditions. The commercial code FIRE is applied to the turbulent combustion process in terms of measured and calculated pressure traces and calculated distributions of mean temperature, OH radical and reaction rate. It turns out that the highest combustion rate occurs for the rich state condition at the spark ignition location due to existence of stoichiometric mixture and timing.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.37 no.8
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• pp.743-752
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• 2013

This is the second paper on the combustion characteristics of landfill gas in a constant volume combustion chamber for a large displacement volume commercial engine, and it discusses the combustion process on the basis of pressure measurements. The results show that the bimodal peak pressure phenomenon, which is caused by the interaction of the heat release and the heat transfer, is more apparent as the mixtures are more favorable to combustion, and the magnitudes of the pressures depend on the unburned fraction. In addition, there exist four main inflection points during heat release owing to variations in the heat transfer area related to flame propagation from the ignition point. Furthermore, the number of inflection points increases as the mixture quality worsens because of the extended burn duration. Consequently, the sophisticated interactions between the heat transfer area changing pattern due to flame propagation and transfer duration might cause very peculiar heat release patterns.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.974-979
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• 2003

This study aimed to analyze spray characteristics and the ambient flow field in the mixture preparation state of the premixed combustion stage. It is very important to understand the spray characteristics and the fuel injection conditions in direct injection diesel engine because the emission gas compositions from diesel engines are related to spray formation processes of the premixed combustion stage. The numerical simulation was performed using the STAR-CD which is a commercial CFD code. Computed results of the transient high pressure diesel spray were compared with experimental results of the same spray injection condition in the constant volume chamber. The results show that spray patterns of numerical simulation agree with this experimental results comparatively.