Experimental investigation of using methanol-diesel blended fuels in diesel engine

Abstract

A comprehensive study on the methanol as an alternative fuel has been carried out. A four stroke four cylinder diesel engine was adopted to study engine power, torque, break specific fuel consumption, break thermal efficiency and exhaust temperature with the fuel of fraction methanol in diesel. In this study, the diesel engine was tested using methanol blended with diesel at certain mixing ratio of 10:90, 20:80 and 30:70 of methanol to diesel respectively. The performance of the engine using blended fuel compared to the performance of engine with diesel fuel. Experimental results showed that the output power and torque for diesel fuel is lower compared to methanol-diesel blended fuel at any ratio. The best mixing ratio that produced the lowest exhaust temperature was at 10% of Methanol in 90% of Diesel fuel. The exhaust temperature for diesel fuel was higher compared to any mixing of the blended fuel. The brake specific fuel consumption for the three mixing ratios was not varying significantly but the lowest was for 30% Methanol and 70% Diesel. The specific fuel consumption for diesel fuel was much lower compared to any mixing ratio. It was noticed that brake thermal efficiency was thus improved in almost all operation conditions with the methanol and diesel blended fuels.