Evaluation of Performance, Combustion and Emission Characteristics of a Compression Ignition Engine using Methyl Esters of Mahua Oil

The increase in fuel price due to inflation and the ruminative shortage in the supply of conventional fuels have led to a serious research and development on the alternate fuel sources. In India one of the option is plant which are available in plenty and can be used as bio fuels. The current utilization of non-edible oilseeds which are available is very low. Bio diesel from ‘Mahua' seed is one option. ‘Mahua' is known as ‘Illupaimaram' in Tamil and ‘Hippi' in Kannada, can be successfully grown in wastelands and dry lands. The seeds of the tree are popularly known as Indian butter tree. In this work, experiments were carried out to study and analyses the emission, combustion and performance characteristics of the mahua methyl esters. For the analysis, the setup consisting of a single cylinder, water-cooled, four stroke diesel engines is used. Initially the engine is run with the diesel fuel and the performance was analyzed. Then the experiments were conducted with blended fuels, mahua methyl esters (B20, B40 and B60) , added in volume basis, and the performance was analyzed. All the tests were conducted with varying conditions of load over the entire range of engine operation. The engine performance parameters such as the BTE (Brake thermal efficiency), SFC (Specific fuel consumption), and emission from exhaust (CO2, CO, NOx, HC and O2) were recorded. The results of the selected mahua mixtures are compared with the neat diesel fuel. Engine performance using the mahua oil and its blends were on par with the experiments performed using pure diesel fuel at most of the loads. The carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrocarbon (HC) emissions of the mahua oil and its blends were found to be lower than that of the diesel fuel at all loads. The carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions were higher for mahua oil blends than that of pure diesel fuel at all loads. Citation: Jayakishan Balagurunathan, SSN College of Engineering; Visveshwar N ,SSN College of Engineering. "Evaluation of Performance, Combustion and Emission Characteristics of a Compression Ignition Engine using Methyl Esters of Mahua Oil ." Global Research and Development Journal For Engineering 112 2016: 42 - 48.