AN EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS ON C.I ENGINE FUELED WITH BLENDS OF PONGAMIA BIODIESEL

This paper investigates the performance and emission of a C.I. engine fueled with various blends of esters of Pongamia oil. In this experiment, transesterification process was done using different alcohols and catalyst. Transesterification process done using methanol as alcohol and KOH as catalyst produces a maximum yield of 96%. Hence, the alcohol produced by that method is used for this test purpose. The test samples used for the test purpose in this experiment were different blends of methyl esters of Pongamia oil, such as 0, 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100% (B0, B20, B40, B60, B80 and B100). Physical and thermal properties of different blends were measured and tabulated. Engine was tested using the blends, and the performance and emission characteristics were compared with diesel as a base fuel. From the result, it can be concluded that blend B20 produces a slightly higher efficiency than diesel and all the blends of biodiesel produce lesser CO than neat diesel. Except B20, all the blends of biodiesel produce lesser NO than diesel.