Grant: Alliance Grants

Development of engines with better fuel economy, reduction of tailpipe emissions to counter global warming and meet government regulations has become the primary focus of automotive industry. Both in-cylinder emission control and aftertreatment are important to decrease the total tailpipe emissions. Advanced in-cylinder strategies can decrease the dependence on aftertreatment system, which can reduce the cost and future enhance system durability. The proposed research project focuses on three important aspects affecting advanced gasoline direct injection (GDI) engine operation, including oxygen sensor performance, fuel injection and spray characterization, and robust engine cold-start strategy investigation. University of Windsor and FCA Canada have formed a collaborative research consortium with the following objectives:1) To investigate the background condition impact on the O2 sensor performance under steady flow and real engine exhaust conditions, including gas species, background temperature/pressure, flow speed, installation angles; enhancing O2 sensor performance via advanced driving strategies for fast response time and precise measurements. 2) To characterize the impact of fuel property on fuel spray penetration, spray cone angle, droplet size distribution, and rate of injection of GDI injectors provided by FCA Canada under various boundary condition, including injection duration, injection pressure and background temperature. 3) To study the combustion and emission characteristics during engine cold-start and develop advanced fuel injection and oxygen sensor control strategies to achieve robust engine cold start process with low tale pipe emissions.The expected outcomes of the proposed research are a) To support CFD verification of oxygen sensor model and GDI spray model by characterizing their performances under various background and operation conditions; b) To develop robust engine cold start strategies suitable for traditional and renewable fuels.