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Miller Cycle Application to the Scuderi Split Cycle
Engine (by Downsizing the Compressor Cylinder)
David Branyon and Dean Simpson
Southwest Research Institute
ABSTRACT
The Scuderi engine is a split cycle design that divides the
four strokes of a conventional combustion cycle over two
paired cylinders, one intake/compression cylinder and one
power/exhaust cylinder, connected by a crossover port. This
configuration provides potential benefits to the combustion
process, as well as presenting some challenges. A Miller
cycle configuration of the engine is made possible by
turbocharging with a downsized compressor cylinder and has
been modeled in 1-dimensional cycle simulation software.
Several positive interactions were found between the split
cycle engine and Miller cycle operating principles, namely:
1. The reduced compression stroke facilitates actual
displacement (and physical size) reduction of the split cycle
engine, providing a more advantageous brake mean effective
pressure (BMEP) characteristic compared to traditional
reciprocating internal combustion engines (RICE) with Miller
cycle operation.
2. Reduction of the compression cylinder displacement
allows Miller cycle operation while still closing the intake
valve at an optimum trapped mass condition. This results in
more favorable pumping work than the Miller cycle applied
to traditional RICE, due to the avoidance of closing the intake
valve during a period of high piston velocity.
3. The extremely high turbulence and resulting fast
combustion and late fuel addition provides a natural knock
avoidance characteristic that allow the utilization of higher
boost levels than are typically achievable with stoichiometric,
spark-ignited engines.
Parametric variations are made across the operating range of
the engine, investigating a range of potential Miller factors
and boost levels. Analysis is performed to determine engine
performance sensitivity to turbomachinery performance. At
2012-01-0419
Published
04/16/2012
Copyright © 2012 SAE International
doi:10.4271/2012-01-0419
low load, a secondary level Miller cycle is applied through
the use of early intake valve closure to provide near throttle-
less load control. Simulation results indicate that high BMEP
and good thermal efficiency are achievable in the main
operating region. The resulting improvements in thermal
efficiency and maximum BMEP provide the potential for
significant fuel energy savings in an automotive application.
BMEP provides benefits both through the effect of
downsizing reducing the mass and size of the engine payload
that must be transported, as well as by allowing the engine to
operate at a higher operational BMEP and therefore higher
efficiency during typical driving conditions.
INTRODUCTION
The Miller cycle, or having higher expansion ratio than
compression ratio, is a well known approach to improving a
reciprocating internal combustion engine's (RICE's) thermal
efficiency. As typically applied to traditional RICEs, it
involves either late or early closing of the intake valve. This
disables the first part of what would normally be the
compression stroke, resulting in a smaller effective
compression stroke and therefore compression ratio (CR).
Combustion and expansion proceed normally, resulting in the
extraction of additional energy from the combustion gases
before expulsion via the exhaust valve and port. Typically,
the geometric CR is increased such that effective CR remains
near the base engine value and the expansion ratio is
increased. In a basic form, applied to a naturally-aspirated
RICE, this would result in a loss in BMEP, but a gain in
thermal efficiency. In practice, the Miller cycle is normally
utilized on turbocharged engines, where the loss in trapped
volume can potentially be made up for with a higher boost
level so that BMEP is maintained. This is generally true
within turbomachinery limitations which include boost limit,
loss of efficiency or choke as pressure ratios reach very high
levels.
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The Scuderi Split-Cycle engine (SSCE) has been reviewed in
[1] and [2]. In short, it consists of paired cylinders to perform
the events of a typical four-stroke cycle engine; one cylinder
of the pair performing intake and compression and the other
cylinder performing the power (or expansion) and exhaust
duties. The two cylinders are out of phase by 20° crank angle
(expander reaching TDC first) and the charge mass is
transferred from the compression cylinder to the expander
cylinder during the period between the expansion cylinder's
TDC and the compression cylinder's TDC. This charge
transfer is through the crossover passage, which is valved at
either end by the “crossover-compression” and “crossover-
expansion” valve(s).
This paper describes the application of the Miller cycle
(overexpansion) to the SSCE and the unique advantages of
the mating of these two technologies.
value to a high value while the intake valve event was
maintained at its maximum volumetric efficiency
characteristic. A knock index is calculated per the general
form of ignition delay given in equation 1 [3], and a limiting
knock index is selected which is a fixed, consistent value for
the entire study. The actual autoignition modified equation
and tuning parameters used are experience-based and
proprietary, but the critical point is that the results achieved
were all at the same relative knock risk. As usual, the ignition
delay parameter was integrated from the time of fuel
admission until the end of combustion to determine if
autoignition (knock) occurred. The compressor stroke that
reaches this knock index limit without exceeding it was
determined to provide the optimum operating point for this
boost level. This is shown in graphical form in Figure 1 for
the 4000 rpm (rated speed) full output condition.

APPROACH
(1)
The fundamental approach to this work was to accomplish
overexpansion of the combustion gases through differential
sizing of the compression and expansion cylinder, rather than
through variation of intake valve closing time. On the split-
cycle engine, the definition of effective compression and
expansion ratios are not clearly obvious. The geometric ratios
are very high for each piston/cylinder combination, but near
top dead center (TDC), the crossover valves are open,
notionally adding the crossover passage volume to the
effective clearance volume to each cylinder. For fixed
cylinder clearance volumes, the displacement volumes of the
SSCE cylinders will effectively control the compression and
expansion ratios with regards to Miller cycle, and these
cylinder volumes are referenced in the subsequent text to
simplify the discussion relating to effective compression and
expansion ratios.

The Miller cycle was applied to a spark-ignited,

stoichiometric, gasoline-fueled version of the SSCE with
baseline naturally-aspirated cylinder displacements of 0.59
and 0.52 liters for the compressor and expander cylinders. A
“black box turbo” was applied, which is a simple,
thermodynamic model of a turbo that takes as input the boost
level and overall turbocharger efficiency (and percent
wastegate flow) and then uses the exhaust thermal energy
level to determine what turbine inlet pressure will be required Figure 1. Volumetric Efficiency of Expander Cylinder
to drive the required compressor power. Using this Relative to Ambient for Several Boost and Compressor
turbocharger model simplifies the analysis and alleviates a Displacement Levels
need for actual turbomachinery maps and the associated re-
sizing that is necessary during such a study as this, but As shown there, for the 1.7 bar (absolute) boost level, the
requires a level of operator knowledge and experience to knock limit is reached at about 77 mm compressor stroke,
provide the proper judgment of appropriate turbomachinery compared to 99 mm for the baseline naturally-aspirated
efficiencies. engine's compressor stroke. As expected, as boost is
increased, the limiting compressor stroke or displacement is
Using this turbocharger model, a fixed boost level is applied. smaller for the same knock index. However, by the
The compressor displacement (stroke) is swept from a low combination of the turbo boost and the compressor cylinder's
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compression, the volumetric efficiency of the expander

cylinder relative to ambient is increasing as boost is
increased. This is due to the fact that after turbocharger
compressor compression, the air is cooled (or “aftercooled”)
and then the remaining compression is performed by the
compressor piston. Since the aftercooler is assumed to have a
fixed outlet temperature of 45°C, increasing compression in
the turbo compressor enables reduced cylinder compression
for a given final pressure ratio, and this lowers the final end-
of-compression temperature. Since knock is positively
correlated with both temperature and pressure, this lower
temperature allows a higher pressure for the same knock
index. The reduced end of compression temperature and
higher pressure both provide increased trapped mass for the
expander cylinder, which in turn provides increased power
density.

Figure 2 displays the performance of the compilation of the Figure 2. BSFC and BMEP of Miller Cycle Operation at
knock-limited points from Figure 1. For each boost level, the 4000 rpm for Two Turbocharger Characteristics
performance data is selected from the optimum compressor
displacement point, which is the knock-limited point. For
these points, brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and
BMEP are provided, for both high and low turbocharger
efficiencies. The engine performance at increasing Miller
factors (i.e. higher boost, smaller compressor cylinder
displacement) is heavily influenced by overall turbocharger
efficiency. To help quantify this effect, analysis was made of
the Miller cycle operation at two different assumed
turbocharger efficiency characteristics as a function of boost
pressure, as shown in Figure 3. These are not specific
performance curves from an actual turbocharger model, but
intended to represent an optimistic and pessimistic (high and
low) view of turbocharger efficiencies that might be
achievable on this class of engine. In this way, the sensitivity
of the engine performance to turbocharger efficiency is
quantified and decisions can be made with respect to the
performance that is likely to be achieved for different markets
and engine sizes. In addition, it should be noted that 28% of
the exhaust flow was deemed to flow through the “wastegate” Figure 3. Two Turbocharger Efficiency Characteristics
for the 4000 rpm maximum output operating point analysis. Used at 4000 Engine rpm
In this simplified turbocharger model, this equates to a
multiplier on the turbine efficiency of 72% which is
mathematically equivalent to a multiplier of 72% on the RESULTS
overall turbocharger efficiency. In other words, a 50% overall
turbocharger efficiency with 28% wastegate flow has an 4000 RPM MAXIMUM OUTPUT
effective overall turbocharger efficiency of 36%. As can be observed in Figure 2, the predicted rated speed
performance of the engine both in terms of BSFC and BMEP
This entire same approach was then repeated at 1400 rpm is improving significantly as the Miller factor is increased,
maximum output, representative of a maximum torque i.e. increasing boost, reducing compressor cylinder
operating point. Impacts of the performance on an estimated displacement, or moving to the right on the graph. This is due
light vehicle cruise point due to potential downsizing were to the volumetric efficiency characteristics shown in Figure 1
then analyzed. and other factors that are unique to the SSCE application and
discussed below.
 Downloaded from SAE International by Istanbul Teknik Universitesi, Tuesday, May 16, 2017
The first of these factors, with regards to BMEP, is that as the
Miller factor is increased, the actual displacement of the
engine decreases. For this reason, the BMEP increases at a
high rate due to a) the increase in expander volumetric
efficiency displayed in Figure 1, which increases expander
power or torque, b) reducing compressor cylinder work, and
c) reducing overall engine displacement, which is effectively
in the denominator of the BMEP term. The relative
magnitudes of these parameters (for the low turbo efficiency
scenario at 4000 rpm) are shown in Figure 4, where the
change in indicated torque for each cylinder is shown as a
percentage of the 1.7 bar case net indicated torque; this gives
the individual cylinder's contribution to the change in IMEP.
Also shown is the percent change in displacement volume.
So, as an example, for the 2.6 bar case, the increase in
expander cylinder torque contributed about 15% to net IMEP
increase, while the reduction in compressor cylinder torque
contributed about 3% with an additional 12% contribution
from reduction in displacement volume. It is interesting to
note that the compressor cylinder work does not decrease as
rapidly as the displacement due to the fact that it is operating
with higher pressure air at the higher boost levels. Of course,
there will also be a reduction in friction work to go with the
reduction in compressor cylinder displacement as this
discussion is carried over to BMEP; in this case, the modeled
friction contribution (reduction as a percentage of net torque)
was less than 2% as the reduction in displacement is offset
with higher operating pressures in both cylinders. With these
advantages, the BMEP of the Miller cycle SSCE increases
from around 13.5 bar at 1.7 bar (absolute) boost to almost 19
bar as a maximum for the low turbocharger efficiency
assumption, and to 21 bar for the high turbocharger efficiency
assumption.
Figure 4. Contribution to BMEP Change at 4000 rpm
In comparison, the application of the Miller cycle to a
traditional RICE enjoys the first two advantages but does not
realize the physically reduced engine displacement since the
same cylinder and piston is used for both compression and
expansion processes. Instead, the traditional RICE “wastes”
the first part of its compression stroke to achieve Miller cycle
operation.
Also, one can clearly see the improvement in BSFC at
increasing Miller factor, to a point which is heavily
influenced by the assumed turbocharger efficiency. This
BSFC improvement is a more typical Miller cycle result, but
is also influenced by the application to the SSCE in that as
the physical displacement is reduced, the friction losses are
reduced providing an additional improvement to efficiency as
the Miller factor is increased. (In the model, the friction
losses are a function of engine displacement along with speed
and peak cylinder pressure per the Chen-Flynn correlation
[4].)
Another factor that improves the performance is the anti-
knock characteristics of the SSCE. In comparison to typical
RICE engines, this is due to two primary factors: late fuel
delivery and fast combustion. The fuel delivery, shortly
before ignition time in the crossover passage, provides
minimal time for fuel decomposition and chemical kinetics
prior to the desired combustion period. (This effect is similar
to the knock avoidance characteristics of direct injected
spark-ignited engines.) Secondly, the very high turbulence
generated by the flow through the XovrE valve just before
ignition results in a quick combustion event. Since end gas
autoignition results from the progression of chemical kinetics
of the end gas mixture prior to flame propagation to that area,
high turbulence and the resulting fast flame propagation and
combustion are powerful knock avoidance tools.
The good anti-knock characteristics of the SSCE allow higher
boost and cycle pressures, further increasing thermal
efficiency.
In addition to the faster burn and knock resistance, the Miller
cycle as applied to the SSCE enjoys another efficiency
advantage over traditional Miller cycle RICEs. Since the
compression displacement reduction is accomplished by
downsizing of the physical compression cylinder on the
SSCE, the intake valve event is maintained at the maximum
volumetric efficiency (or optimum) setting. In comparison,
the traditional RICE uses early or late intake valve closing
(IVC) to accomplish the reduction in compression. This
results in the RICE closing the intake valve at high piston
(and therefore air) velocities, which results in a poor pumping
work scenario. Taking a late IVC approach for example, the
intake valve is closing while the piston is rising at significant
velocity and there is high gas velocity and pressure drop
through the small intake valve opening. Therefore, the piston
is doing significant compression work on the gas in the
cylinder, which is above intake manifold pressure, but this
work is not conserved for later recovery due to the fact that
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there is still mass flow across the small valve opening. When
applying the Miller cycle to a traditional RICE, this trade-off
restricts the benefit that can be achieved at high Miller
factors, which result in the highest pumping losses. When
applying the Miller cycle to the SSCE, this trade-off is
avoided entirely.
1400 RPM MAXIMUM OUTPUT
Next, the same approach was taken at 1400 rpm, which is
taken as the peak torque speed for this engine. One
significant difference though is that the wastegate is assumed
to be fully closed for the analysis at this operating point.
Figure 5 provides the BSFC and BMEP vs. boost for this
operating condition, based on the same knock-limited
analysis performed at 4000 rpm. This analysis was done
without regard to the 4000 rpm analysis, meaning that boost
levels and/or likely turbomachinery configuration and
compressor cylinder displacement were not constrained to
match between the two. Similar results are observed as were
shown at 4000 rpm, except that the results for the high and
low turbo efficiencies are closer together. This is because the
assumption of overall turbocharger efficiency vs. boost level
was modified to more closely represent typical turbocharger
operation towards the lower end of the engine speed
spectrum. Figure 6 shows the overall turbocharger efficiency
assumptions that were made for the 1400 rpm analysis, with
the 4000 rpm assumptions included for comparison.
Figure 5. BSFC and BMEP of Miller Cycle Operation at
1400 rpm for Two Turbocharger Characteristics
Figure 6. Turbocharger Efficiency Characteristics at
1400 Engine rpm (With 4000 rpm for Comparison)
As displayed in Figure 5, the potential performance gains at
1400 rpm are even greater than those observed at 4000 rpm,
largely due to the better turbocharger efficiency characteristic
that is expected. BMEP is increased from 15 to over 21 bar
from 1.7 bar (ab solute) boost to the the maximum boost
analyzed. At the same time, BSFC improves from 250 g/
kW.hr to less than 240 g/kW.hr. The same factors that
provide the BSFC and BMEP increases at 4000 rpm also
apply at 1400 rpm.
• Higher BMEP through higher mass into the expansion
cylinder, lower compression work, and lower engine
displacement
◦ Lower engine displacement aspect unique to Miller
cycle application to the SSCE
• Improved BSFC due to lower friction achieved through
physical downsizing of compressor cylinder
◦ Unique to SSCE
• Improved BSFC due to high knock resistance and reduced
pumping losses relative to traditional Miller RICE
◦ Unique to SSCE
BROAD PERFORMANCE
IMPLICATIONS
After the analysis of 4000 and 1400 rpm maximum load
performance was completed, consideration was made of the
optimum configuration for a multi-speed engine running
across this speed range and lower. Primarily, this meant
constraining the compressor stroke to be the same at the two
conditions. It was observed that regardless of turbocharger
efficiency assumptions, the area below 50 mm compressor
stroke (and corresponding displacement) was not appealing
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for compressor cylinder displacement due to considerations

of 4000 rpm performance (hence the notation on Figure 5).
Looking at both results, a 55 mm compressor stroke was
selected as the optimum compressor displacement and
resulting Miller factor.

Selecting the points at 55 mm compressor stroke from each

speed analysis (using the points from the “low turbo
efficiency” curves to be conservative) results in the
achievement of just under 19 bar BMEP at 4000 rpm and
about 19.5 bar BMEP at 1400 rpm. This is roughly twice the
nominal naturally-aspirated engine BMEP targets. For a
passenger car application, a certain power level is desired
from the engine for suitable vehicle performance. As the
Miller cycle SSCE engine is able to produce twice the BMEP
and hence specific power compared to the naturally-aspirated
version, it means that the engine could be downsized by 50%
for the same maximum power, torque, and vehicle Figure 7. Low Load (Cruise) Efficiency Comparison
performance. The advantage of this is that the engine will
then operate at twice the BMEP during typical operation. A
typical representative cruise point is sometimes taken as 2 bar NEXT STEPS
BMEP at a moderate engine speed. However, if an engine
Future work on the Miller cycle SSCE will focus on the
had sufficient power to be downsized by 50% in
application of real turbocharger maps with a real turbocharger
displacement, this would increase to 4 bar BMEP for the
model in the cycle simulation to verify that these results can
downsized engine. This has the potential to produce a large
be obtained from available hardware. This will confirm not
fuel consumption savings at this operating point. Figure 7
only the levels of boost that are attainable from maps of
provides the low load performance of the Miller cycle SSCE
actual hardware, but also with measured turbomachinery
with 55 mm compressor stroke per the full load final setting.
efficiencies of the size appropriate for the engine in question
Results are shown for load control obtained by secondary
and will also help determine wastegate calibration and other
Miller cycle, i.e. late IVC timing in comparison to load
engine performance details.
control achieved by inlet throttling. The performance in this
area has not been optimized; this is simply a representation of
a typical part load performance characteristic. In Figure 7, it SUMMARY
can be seen that while the BSFC at 2 bar BMEP is around Miller cycle operation was applied to the SSCE by physical
430 g/kW.hr, at 4 bar BMEP it is reduced to approximately downsizing of the compressor cylinder. This was shown to
320 g/kW.hr, a 25% reduction. In terms of passenger car provide large improvements to the engine performance in
drive cycle mileage, this is the largest impact of the terms of both BMEP and BSFC at full load operating points
performance improvements that are realized through the at 1400 and 4000 rpm. These results are indicative of some of
application of the Miller cycle to the SSCE. Although the full the gains that could be made in any type of engine where full
load BSFC values are improved on the order of 5-10%, the load operational specific torque and efficiency are important
vehicle spends very little time at these high load conditions. performance parameters.
However, the increase in full load BMEP and the downsizing
that is facilitated by that high BMEP pays large dividends in An analysis was also performed of the light load efficiency of
terms of light-load fuel consumption, which makes up the the Miller-SSCE combination. In view of a typical passenger
bulk of light vehicle drive cycles. car application, an estimation of the fuel savings associated
with the allowable downsizing shows that a 25% fuel
consumption reduction is potentially achievable solely by
downsizing, comparing the two load points from this same
Miller cycle SSCE.

The application of the Miller cycle operation to the SSCE

provides the typical Miller cycle benefits that are observed
with traditional RICE engines in addition to several new and
unique or improved benefits specific to the synergy between
these two technologies. Further analysis will follow to further
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quantify and verify the potential benefits of such a CR

combination. Compression Ratio

REFERENCES IMEP
1. Phillips, F., Gilbert, I., Pirault, J., and Megel, M., “Scuderi Indicated Mean Effective Pressure
Split Cycle Research Engine: Overview, Architecture and
Operation,” SAE Int. J. Engines 4(1):450-466, 2011, doi:
IVC
10.4271/2011-01-0403.
Intake Valve Closing
2. Meldolesi, R., Bailey, G., Lacy, C., Gilbert, I. et al.,
“Scuderi Split Cycle Fast Acting Valvetrain: Architecture and
RICE
Development,” SAE Int. J. Engines 4(1):467-481, 2011, doi:
Reciprocating Internal Combustion Engine
10.4271/2011-01-0404.
3. Ramos, J.I. “Internal Combustion Engine Modeling”,
Hemisphere Publishing Co., New York, NY, 1989. SSCE
Scuderi Split Cycle Engine
4. Chen, S. and Flynn, P., “Development of a Single
Cylinder Compression Ignition Research Engine,” SAE
Technical Paper 650733, 1965, doi: 10.4271/650733. TDC
Top Dead Center
CONTACT INFORMATION
τ
David P. Branyon, Staff Engineer
ignition delay
SwRI Design and Development Department
david.branyon@swri.org
a, b, c
Ignition delay equation tuning parameters
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank the members of the SwRI Oct#
Design & Development Department that have contributed to Octane number of fuel
and reviewed this work.

The authors would also like to acknowledge Scuderi Group Pcyl

LLC for their kind permission to publish this paper. Cylinder Pressure

DEFINITIONS/ABBREVIATIONS Tub
Unburned Zone Gas Temperature
BMEP
Brake Mean Effective Pressure

BSFC
Brake Specific Fuel Consumption

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