Nature of Heat Release Rate in an Engine

P M V Subbarao
Professor
Mechanical Engineering Department

The Pace of Net Heat Addition

Influence the Area of the

Net Heat Addition in an Engine

m number of reactants convert into n number of products, in order
to release the required heat in an engine cycle.
Net available air will influence the number and quantity of
products.
The fraction of fuel chemical energy available due incomplete
combustion is quantified using combustion efficiency.
The net chemical energy release due to actual combustion with in
the engine is:

H R Tamb H p Tamb m

The combustion Efficiency:

EoC

SoC

gen

~o
x

h
i f ,i

i , reactants

comb

~o
y jh f , j

j , products

H R Tamb H p Tamb
m f ,act QHV

comb m f ,act QHV

The Approach to Estimate Optimal Designs

At a time when optimum designs and systems need to be
developed as quickly as possible and at minimum cost, the
following advantages are particularly attractive.
The development of a more complete understanding of the
physical system that emerges during formulation of the
model.
The identification of key controlling variables which
provides guidelines for rational and less costly
experimental test programs.
The ability to predict behavior over a wide range of design
and operating variables.

 These variables can be used;

to screen concepts prior to major hardware programs,
to determine trends and tradeoffs and,
if the model is sufficiently accurate, to optimize design and
control.
One need to strengthen commitment to continuous
development of IC engine models that will be applicable
to the problems at hand.

Development of Phenomenological Combustion Model

Combustion rate is generally specified by some functional
relationship where the start of combustion,soc, the combustion
duration, , and the current crank angle are related.
Two examples of such functions are the cosine burning law

soc
dX

. sin

d
2

and the Wiebe function

dX
soc
a m 1

d

dX
d

exp

soc
a

the rate at which unburned mass

is consumed by the flame

m 1

 The most common method of defining cumulative

combustion is with a mass fraction burned curve.

Qgen
d d
soc

MFB

m f ,total comb LHV

Mass fraction burned is the ratio of the cumulative heat release

to the total heat release.
Therefore if the mass fraction burned is known as a function of
crank angle, then the apparent heat release can be approximated.
When the cumulative mass fraction burned is graphed against
crank angle degrees, the curve can be described using a Wiebe
function

The Wiebe function

soc
MFB 1 exp a

is crank angle degrees with soc

corresponding to the
initialization of heat release and
corresponding to the
duration of burn.
The equation is also defined by
two constants a and m which
have typical values of 5 and 3
respectively.

m 1

Measurement of Mass Burn Rate

Qp

Qgen
mp

p
p

m p 1

exp a

mp

Qd
a
d

md

md 1

exp a

md

The parameters p and d represent the duration of the premixed

and diffusion combustion phases.
Qp and Qd represent the integrated energy release for premixed and
diffusion phases respectively.
The constants a, mp and md are selected to match experimental
data.

Qgen Qloss
Cv dV Cv dp mmixTmix Rmix d
V

p
2
d
d
Rmix d Rmix d
1 d

Real MFB Curve in an Engine

Nature of Real Combustion

The combustion has two modes.
A dual mode combustion mass fraction burned curve is
required to predict actual combustion process.
To determine the best way to model the real combustion,
the MFB curve is separated into two parts.
The first section burns with an abundance of oxygen and
should resemble a Wiebe curve.
For the second half of the curve, the combustion is very
slow and is nearly linear in many cases.

Dual Phase MFB Curves

Model Constants
The values of a1 and a2 in the two Wiebe approximation
ranged from 10 to 2000 and 3 to 37 respectively.
The values of the m constants also changed between the
two types of approximations.
The values of m1 and m2 ranged from 2 to 9 and 2 to 8
instead of about 3.
The value of x, the scale factor, ranges from 0.5 to 0.9.

Variation in Mass Fraction Burned Coefficients

SI Engine

a1
m1
a2
m2
x

The Actual Release of Net Heat Rate

Mixture Burn Time vs Engine Speed

The time for an overall burn is:
t90%

90%
min 360o

60 s rev

If we take a typical value of 50o crank angle for the overall burn
N (rpm)

t90%(ms)

Standard car at idle

500

16.7

Standard car at max power

4,000

2.1

Formula car at max power

19,000

0.4

Note: To achieve such high engine speeds a formula car engine has
a very short stroke and large bore.

Design Centered Burn Rate Model

One of the major criticisms of the phenomenological models has
been the a priori specification of the burn rate.
This has resulted in the use of engineering judgment for
interpreting parameter studies produced by these models.
In an attempt to alleviate this inadequacy, several investigators
have proposed models to predict the rate of burning in sparkignited engines.
Ideally, such a model should be based on fundamental physical
quantities such as:
The turbulent intensity urms
The turbulent integral length scale, l
The turbulent micro-scale,
The specification of the kinetics.

The model should be able to

predict the ignition delay time and
combustion duration for variations
in engine operating conditions, i.e.
spark timing, EGR, equivalence
ratio, load and engine speed.

Phases of Combustion in Homogeneous SI Engine

End of Combustion
Start of Combustion

Ignition

Crank Angle,

Air-fuel Mixture Formation

For spark ignition engines, the fuel-air mixture preparation

process is known to have a significant influence on engine
performance and exhaust emissions.
Mixture preparation precedes all the other engine processes by
metering the ambient air and fuel and forming a mixture that
satisfies the requirements of the engine over its entire operating
regime.
This has a dominant effect on the subsequent combustion
process and control the engine fuel consumption, power output,
exhaust emissions and other operating performance.
The structures of port injector spray dominates the mixture
preparation process and strongly affect the subsequent engine
combustion characteristics over a wide range of operating
conditions.

Induction of Fuel in SI Engine

The task of the engine induction and fuel systems is to
prepare from ambient air and fuel in the tank an air-fuel
mixture that satisfies the requirement of the engine.
This preparation is to be carried out over entire engine
operating regime.
In principle, the optimum air-fuel ratio for an engine is that
which give the required power output with the lowest fuel
consumption.
It should also ensure smooth and reliable operation.
The fuel Induction systems for SI engine are classified as:
Carburetors.
Throttle body Fuel Injection Systems.
Multi Point Fuel Injection Systems.

The Carburetor: A Natural Fuel Induction System