Performance characteristics of palm kernel biodiesel and its blend in a CI engine

The full load performance characteristics of a diesel engine fuelled with palm kernel biodiesel and its blend with diesel fuel are presented in this paper. The biodiesel was synthesised from Nigerian palm kernel oil through a direct base catalysed transesterification process using sodium hydroxide and methanol as the catalyst and alcohol, respectively. The produced biodiesel was blended with neat diesel fuel at a ratio of 20% biodiesel to 80% diesel by volume. The engine torque, brake power, brake specific fuel consumption and brake mean effective pressure were determined for each of the fuels at 400 rpm intervals between 1200 and 3600 rpm. In other to establish a baseline for comparison, the engine was first run on neat diesel. The test results interestingly revealed that the fuel blend (B20) produced higher torque at low and medium engine speeds than neat diesel fuel and unblended biodiesel (B100). This suggests that it can be a suitable fuel for heavy duty engines that are required to develop high torque at low engine speeds. It was also observed that diesel fuel developed higher torque and brake power than the unblended biodiesel (B100) at all tested speeds and showed the least brake specific fuel consumption possibly because of its higher heating value. In all, the palm kernel biodiesel and its blend (B20) exhibited performance characteristic trends very similar to that of diesel fuel thus confirming them as suitable alternative fuels for compression ignition engines.