A novel strategy of extremely delayed intake valve opening to improve the cold-start characteristics of a low compression ratio diesel engine

Combined in-cylinder and after-treatment emission control methods are generally adopted to meet the current stringent emission targets for diesel engines. It is well established that reducing the geometric compression ratio (CR) results in a simultaneous reduction in the oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and soot emissions in diesel engines. However, poor cold-start characteristics prevent extensive use of low compression ratio (LCR) diesel engines for automotive applications. In the present work, a novel extremely delayed intake valve opening (IVO) strategy is proposed to improve the cold-start characteristics of a light-duty LCR diesel engine. A commercial one-dimensional gas-exchange model was used to optimize the intake valve open and close timings. The results corresponding to a cranking speed of 200 rpm and ambient temperature of 0 degrees C show that advancing the intake valve close (IVC) timing increases the effective compression stroke that can improve the cylinder temperature by 5%. Further, implementing 'extremely delayed IVO' by retarding the timing from 1 degrees CA to 61 degrees CA aTDC could help to further increase the cylinder temperature by 14% compared to the base timings. The delayed opening of the intake valve leads to a higher expansion of the cylinder mass, leading to a lower cylinder pressure before IVO and a higher intake air velocity immediately after IVO. With the higher intake air velocity, the incoming air's kinetic energy is dissipated to increase the stagnation temperature, resulting in an overall benefit in cylinder temperature. The experimental measurements conducted in a cold chamber with the optimized IVO and IVC timings confirmed the benefits by achieving a better cold-startability of the LCR engine. In comparison, the LCR engine with the stock valve timings could be started only up to +5 degrees C, the optimized valve timings could ensure startability up to -10 degrees C without any starting aids. Thus, the proposed approach of adopting the optimized valve timings can help LCR diesel engines to overcome the limitations of cold-startability.