Influence of swirl ratio on fuel distribution and cyclic variation under flash boiling conditions in a spark ignition direct injection gasoline engine

One effective way of suppressing the cycle-to-cycle variation in engine is to design a combustion system that is robust to the root causes of engine variation over the entire engine working process. Flash boiling has been demonstrated as an ideal technique to produce stable fuel spray. But the generation of stable intake flow and fuel mixture remains challenging. In this study, to evaluate the capability of enhanced swirl flow to produce repeatable fuel mixture formation, the fuel distribution inside a single cylinder optical engine under two swirl ratios were measured using laser induced fluorescence technique. The swirl ratio was regulated by a swirl control valve installed in one of the intake ports. A 266 nm wavelength laser sheet from a frequency-quadrupled laser was directed into the optical engine through the quartz liner 15 mm below the tip of the spark plug. The fluorescence signal from the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon in gasoline was collected by applying a 320-420 nm band pass filter mounted in front of an intensified charge coupled device camera. Test results show that the in-cylinder fuel distribution is strongly influenced by the swirl ratio. Specifically, under high swirl condition, the fuel is mainly concentrated on the left side of the combustion chamber. While under the low swirl flow, fuel is distributed more randomly over the observing plane. This agrees well with the measurements of the stable flame location. Additionally, the cycle-to-cycle variation of the fuel distribution were analyzed. Results show that well organized fuel mixture with lower cycle-to-cycle variation is achieved by enhanced swirl flow.