Modeling study of soot formation and oxidation in DI diesel engine using an improved soot model

Particulate emission is one of the most deleterious pollutants generated by Diesel fuel combustion. The ability to predict soot formation is one of the key elements needed to optimize the engine performance and minimize soot emissions. This paper reports work on developing, a phenomenological soot model to better model the physical and chemical processes of soot formation in Diesel fuel combustion. This hybrid model features that the effect of turbulence on the chemical reaction rate was considered in soot oxidation. Soot formation and oxidation processes were modeled with the application of a hybrid method involving particle turbulent transport controlled rate and soot oxidation rate. Compared with the original soot model, the in-cylinder pressures, heat release rate and soot emissions predicted by this hybrid model agreed better with the experimental results. The verified hybrid model was used to investigate the effect of injection timing on engine performance. The results show that the new soot model predicted reasonable soot spatial profiles within the combustion chamber. The high temperature gas zone in cylinder for hybrid model case is distributed broadly soot and NOx emission dependence on the start-of-injection (SOI) timing. Retarded SOI timing increased the portion of diffusion combustion and the soot concentration increased significantly with retarding of the fuel injection timing. The predicted distributions of soot concentration and particle mass provide some new insights on the soot formation and oxidation processes in direct injection (DI) engines. The hybrid phenomenological soot model shows greater potential for enhancing understanding of combustion and soot formation processes in DI diesel engines.