Professional Documents
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Volvo D5 Volvo D5 - Ricardo
Volvo D5 Volvo D5 - Ricardo
Volvo D5 Volvo D5 - Ricardo
William
William Clay
Clay Ford
Ford Jnr
Jnr
Race transmissions
Improving
Improving on
Lean Boost
on the
the very
very best
best
Volvo D5
The world’s first all-aluminium
Direct Injection five-cylinder diesel engine was
New
New route
route to
to engine
engine downsizing
downsizing developed in record time – with the
Spring 2002 help of Ricardo know-how
Our automotive systems
make driving more of a pleasure.
Today’s driver expects their journey to be a much more enjoyable And we continuously improve performance by using our
and productive experience. understanding of vehicle dynamics and chassis systems to create
ride and handling that improves the enjoyment of any journey.
To deliver this, Visteon is continuously developing the in-car
environment. Our interiors, climate control, communication and Our philosophy of designing systems with the driver in mind
entertainment systems are flexible enough to meet drivers’ has prompted 18 of the world’s top 20 vehicle manufacturers to
individual desires and, of course, their comfort and safety needs. work with us.
From an environmental perspective, our engine management To find out more about how Visteon make vehicles more of
systems cut emissions without cutting back on performance. a pleasure for today’s driver, visit www.visteon.com
contents 14
Spring 2002
4 8 6
automaker plans a reduction of North American plant The turn of the century has proved dif-
ficult for the Ford Motor Company.
manufacturing operating capacity by about one million What is the overriding message that
units. This will mean the loss of around 12,000 hourly you have got to get across to both
company workers and car buyers?
employees in North America, plus an additional 1,500 We are not a nameless, faceless corpora-
salaried personnel, to reach a goal of 5,000. tion. We are global, but we are also local
and a family firm. We must re-polish the
A material cost reduction programme has been blue oval and get it shining brightly again.
Right now we are in the middle of a
initiated with North American suppliers which, along painful but necessary transformation of
with other material cost reduction efforts, should our company. We’ve made some progress
but we are not finished yet. Our
improve ongoing annual pre-tax profits by $3 billion by Revitalisation Plan is based on executing
the fundamentals of our business to build
mid-decade. Ford’s new CEO spoke to Anthony Lewis great products. What we are outlining is a
and Chris Wright at the North American International comprehensive plan that builds for the
future. It’s going to take everyone in the
Auto Show in Detroit earlier this year. extended Ford family – employees, suppli-
ers and dealers – working together, over
models of physical engineering phenomena. gramme progressed. To start with, says product. In the event these fears proved
If the phenomena represented are the same Crabb, “It was them doing 100 percent of the largely unfounded, and only the four-cylinder
in two codes and an equal level of attention work for us”. However, by the start of produc- (which clashed directly with the PSA-Ford
is paid to modelling, the results should be tion Volvo were 100 percent responsible for co-operative unit of similar capacity) was
compatible – which is what we found.” the build process with Ricardo and AVL pro- dropped from the programme.
With all the factors pointing in the desired viding support. Derek Crabb doubts whether the decision
direction – that diesel versions of Volvo’s The partners faced a tough set of targets to go ahead with the diesel programme
existing gasoline engines were the best way – and not only those imposed by the excep- would have been any different under Ford
to go – the formal decision to go was finally tionally tight 24-month programme timetable. than in the pre-Ford era: “The business case
taken in December 1998, though the split of Derek Crabb again: “We very much said to was sound, and Ford accepts sound busi-
responsibilities had been agreed before this. Ricardo: ‘This is the block and crank we’ve ness cases.”
“It had to be a very rapid programme,” got – we think it can go into a diesel of this What did change under Ford, however,
recalls Derek Crabb. “Though we had built capacity and we think we can get this num- were the horizons and the ambitions encom-
the concept engines, the final decision to go ber of horsepower and this much torque. passed by the programme. Derek Crabb
with this concept was taken very late, and we Please can you validate this.’” takes up the story once more:
were targeting early 2001 for completion.” Further targets were set in terms of fuel “By this time Dr Reitzle had entered the
The partners agreed on a gradual transfer consumption, emissions, NVH, packaging scene. He basically said that we should aim
of responsibility to Volvo Car as the pro- and of course durability. At this stage the upwards. He urged us to ‘go for the BMW
programme was for a family of six-cylinder – use that as your benchmark …
three engines based on the inline I accept that we’ve only got a five-cylinder,
four, five and six-cylinder gasoline but the BMW is the car that we’re competing
units: Volvo’s overriding priority of with, and that’s what we must use on all our
crash safety had always meant that test drives.’”
broader V-configuration designs, Dr Reitzle’s exhortation to take on the very
which reduce the available impact best only added to the challenges faced by
absorbing crumple zones, were out Ricardo. Yet there was an important trump
of the question. card: Volvo had the promise of being the
Of the three diesels it was the lead customer for Bosch’s very latest, sec-
2.5 litre five-cylinder, designed to ond-generation common rail injection system
power the as-yet unrevealed new- with its attendant major potential benefits in
shape V70 and S60 models, that emissions, consumption and NVH control.
was singled out as the top priority. This, coupled with the pioneering use of an
Yet even this suddenly appeared all-aluminium cylinder block and electronical-
up in the air when Ford announced ly-controlled cooled exhaust gas recircula-
its takeover of Volvo in February tion, promised to make the Volvo D5 the
1999: the concern was that Volvo most advanced passenger car diesel engine
would be encouraged to utilise the in the world as well as a highly effective
existing Ford diesel range rather motor for Volvo’s advance into the premium
than continue developing its own executive segment.
F
or the last two seasons the Audi R8 although the relationship between the two considerably greater than just the supply of
has been the class of the field, companies went back long before then. differentials.
whether it be at the classic Le Mans “Ricardo had been working with Audi on the “From supplying individual components,”
24 Hour race or the gruelling American Le German Touring Car and rally programmes says Barge, “it was an order of magnitude
Mans Series (ALMS). Its victories at the for around 10 years, and I think they recog- switching to delivering a gearbox.” However,
Sarthe circuit proved its domination with a 1- nised our capability and were happy with the this programme being Audi’s first foray into
2-3 result in 2000 followed by a first and sec- work we had done,” says Mark Barge, motor- sportscar racing, the Ingolstadt manufacturer
ond last year, and in ALMS it has been beat- sport director at the Ricardo Midlands still needed a high level of control and so
en only three times in the last two years. So Technical Centre at Leamington Spa. For the decided on a division of labour. While Audi
now Audi comes into its third season as the sportscar programme, though, the level of took responsibility for the casing and its
team to beat – a track record which brings its responsibility placed on Ricardo was to be transmission department acted as the inter-
own pressures. face with all the other vehicle architecture
Ricardo first became involved in Audi’s within the company, Ricardo concentrated on
racing sportscar project in 1998 when work all the internal components of the transmis-
began on the R8, sion system.
“We already had a good way of working,”
Barge continues, “so off we went.
What we really benefited from is the
fact that Ricardo puts a great deal of
effort into both its research pro-
grammes and the development of its
tools and technologies, and the two
lines converged. We were therefore able
to demonstrate our ability to use these
techniques on a new gearbox.”
Three years and many victories later, the
scenario has changed greatly. The success
of the R8 has been truly outstanding. In fact
it can claim to be one of the most successful
racing cars ever produced. Of course, the
transmission has played a vital role – a role
which has led to mutual trust and respect
Flagship programme: between the two companies. So after the first
Ricardo transmission for season’s racing in 1999, Ricardo took
Audi R8 has been out- responsibility for the entire transmission sys-
standingly successful tem. In effect, this meant a new gearbox for
T
he ability to move rapidly, and across specifications. In addition to this, it needed to
difficult and potentially hostile terrain, be single-hoop in configuration to free the
is increasingly important to the British upper structure for more high-calibre
Army. In addition to their more long-standing weapons mountings than the previous design
commitments, British forces have in the past could handle. A series of finite element
year alone been deployed on peace-keeping analyses were carried out to develop and
missions in Europe, Africa and Asia. optimise the new design, which was subject-
Traditionally the Land Rover has been the ed to physical roll-over crash testing in a pro-
backbone of general military transportation, totype vehicle.”
but in its adapted form – the Rapid But rapid deployment of forces in most sit-
Deployment Vehicle, or RDV – it occupies a uations requires the use of aircraft to trans-
leading role in peace-keeping situations port equipment to the theatre of operations.
requiring rapid deployment. For this reason the design of the RDV also
The success of the RDV is based on work had to be made sufficiently robust for
carried out at the Shoreham facility of air-portability. As such it can be car-
Ricardo Vehicle Engineering over the last ten ried internally in a C130
years. John Lake, general manager for Lockheed Hercules, and either
Special Vehicles, takes up the story: “The internally or under-slung in
original concept on which the RDV is based standard helicopter transports
was developed in 1993. We developed a such as the Chinook.
conversion kit which could turn a standard While the roll cage is the
Land Rover Defender into a multi-role com- most immediately striking
bat vehicle incorporating a robust roll cage feature of the RDV
and weapons mounting. Land Rover, it is
“A small number of these initial kits were the flexibility of
sold, predominantly to overseas forces. this concept
However, the idea attracted the attention of
the British Army for use in a potentially much
larger programme, and in 1997 Ricardo was
asked to develop the concept on a more
robust scale.
“The most immediate area for further
development was the roll cage, which had to
meet the extremely stringent military roll-over
Finite element analysis (far left) was employed to develop a roll-cage to meet the
extremely stringent military roll-over and air-drop specifications
W
hatever the ultimate fate of the energy loss in a gasoline engine, it becomes ment, which in turn enables a higher com-
Kyoto protocol, the pressure on immediately apparent that there are four pression ratio with its associated improved
manufacturers to reduce vehicle areas in which you can address efficiency thermal efficiency (see figure 2).
CO2 emissions is likely to continue to improvements” says Lake (see figure 1). The theoretical basis of the LBDI concept
increase in the coming years. “First of all you can attempt to reduce the can be explained in terms of the effect of
In Europe, through an agreement by the thermal energy being lost through the boost pressure on the operating band of air-
representative body ACEA, manufacturers exhaust gases. Secondly there is the heat fuel ratio of the engine. As the intake air
are committed to a new vehicle fleet average lost from the engine to its coolant and oil. pressure is increased, so the achievable indi-
CO2 emissions level of 140g/km by 2008 Thirdly there is the energy consumed in cated mean effective pressure (IMEP) also
(against an average of 185g/km in 1995 and mechanical friction, and finally there are the increases. At the rich limit of air-fuel mixture
174g/km in 1999). Similarly in the US the losses associated with the processes of gas for a given boost pressure (the minimum
prospect of bringing SUVs into the passen- exchange. In developing the LBDI concept practical excess air factor), combustion sta-
ger car CAFE standard is refocusing atten- we are seeking to address improvements in bility is hindered by ignition retardation due
tion on fuel economy. But while gasoline all of these areas simultaneously.” to knock. So with increasing boost pressure,
engine fuel efficiency improvements over the One of the most promising avenues for the rich limit becomes more lean. Similarly,
last three decades have been impressive, to these improvements in both gasoline and at the lean limit of air-fuel mixture for a given
say the least, much of the benefit derived diesel engines is ‘downsizing’: the develop- level of boost, combustion stability is limited
from this has been swallowed up in the ment of engines of increased specific output by spark initiation and flame propagation.
increasing kerb weight of today’s typical pas- and reduced swept volume. The LBDI gaso- As this limit improves with boost, the over-
senger cars. line engine is an example of this, combining all operating band becomes leaner with
The impending fuel efficiency challenge is direct injection, lean operation and pressure increasing boost. At any given boost pres-
all the greater therefore. Greater, that is, charging to enable a smaller engine – with sure, as the air-fuel ratio moves from the rich
unless customers are to be weaned off their consequently fewer losses and hence to the lean limit, engine output will decrease.
taste for increasingly higher specification greater fuel efficiency – to take the place of The objective in developing an LBDI engine
(and hence higher weight) vehicles – a larger and less efficient current production is therefore to boost to the desired level of
prospect which few manufacturers regard as engines. IMEP for the downsized engine – typically
a likely one. A fundamental concern with the operation significantly higher than that achieved at stoi-
For Tim Lake and his gasoline research of a pressure charged gasoline engine is the chiometric operation of the equivalent natu-
team at Ricardo Consulting Engineers, this minimum octane requirement of the fuel. rally aspirated engine – while maintaining a
challenge of pushing the boundaries of fuel Typically, manufacturers seek to reduce the homogenous lean mixture of between 1.4
efficiency is extremely familiar. They are compression ratio in a boosted engine to and 1.6 excess air factor. To minimise the air-
responsible for the company’s gasoline avoid combustion knock. Unfortunately, while flow demand on the engine (and hence gas
research programmes and are pursuing a knock may be avoided, this reduction of exchange losses) the richest mixture that
range of new technologies for improved fuel compression ratio has the unwanted side allows stable operation at the desired IMEP
economy. One such initiative is the develop- effect of reducing thermal efficiency. is selected (see figure 3).
ment of a new Lean Boost Direct Injection However, the LBDI concept’s combination of So much for the theory. What about the
(LBDI) gasoline combustion concept. direct injection and homogenous lean opera- practical validation?
“If you examine the typical sources of tion both act to reduce the octane require- “There is a range of tools available to us
in assessing a concept such as this,”
explains Lake. “Most of the development
work is typically carried out on a single-cylin-
der research engine, and the Ricardo Hydra
is an obvious choice for this. For the initial
development work a 74mm bore, 75.5mm
stroke configuration was used, giving a
swept volume of 324.7cc. In parallel with the
single-cylinder test programme we also con-
duct a significant amount of CAE work using
software tools such as WAVE and VECTIS”.
One application of CAE is to assess the
likely multi-cylinder performance based on
Figure 1: Typical brake output and energy losses
at part load (left) and full load (right)
the test results from the Hydra. It is well
established that the volumetric efficiency of limiting factor rather than maximum power. a 4000 lb (1800kg) sports utility vehicle
single-cylinder research engines is often To move beyond this level of downsizing and intended for the US market, incorporating a
lower than their production multi-cylinder achieve even greater fuel efficiency benefits 4.0-litre PFI naturally-aspirated engine as a
counterparts. For this reason a higher boost would be possible, but it would require the comparator for a 3.0-litre LBDI unit with the
pressure is applied in single-cylinder test addition of more advanced boosting con- same alternative calibrations as the
work in order to match and correlate the cepts such as an electrically-assisted tur- European example. In this case the vehicle
likely performance of the multi-cylinder bocharger or, alternatively, mild hybridisation. was evaluated against the FTP drive cycle.
application. In order to evaluate the LBDI concept in a Fuel economy improvement for the LBDI
Combustion stability is widely accepted as European vehicle application, a simulation compared with the PFI engine was greatest
presenting perhaps the most significant chal- model was created to represent a generic (up to 13 per cent) for the city cycle where
lenge to the development of LBDI gasoline lower-medium C-segment car typical of cur- operation at part load gives maximum advan-
engines. “We knew in advance that cycle-to- rent production and powered by 1.6-litre PFI tage. The overall combined EPA fuel econo-
cycle variations in IMEP were likely to arise naturally-aspirated engine. This was com- my benefit was 10 per cent for the optimal
from a number of contributory factors such pared with two further models powered by a fuel economy calibration and seven per cent
as air-fuel ratio, ignition timing, injection tim- 1.2-litre LBDI gasoline engine with VNT tur- for the low NOx calibration.
ing and boost pressure,” commented Lake. bocharger and intercooler, respectively cali- The results so far look very promising, but
“However, we found that by far the greatest brated for optimal fuel economy and for low where next for LBDI research and develop-
impact on stability came from the ignition NOx. Over the NEDC drive cycle the LBDI ment? “The LBDI concept shows consider-
system used.” vehicle with maximum fuel economy calibra- able potential and has attracted a lot of inter-
The team found that through incrementally tion was predicted as delivering a 17.5 per est from the OEMs,” says Lake. “We have
optimising the ignition system during the cent improvement in fuel consumption with a already started on the next stage of the
development programme, they were able to similar improvement in CO2 emissions. research in collaboration with a number of
increase significantly the maximum combus- Against this, the low NOx calibration of the engineering partners including Ford and
tion-stable level of IMEP. The final ignition lean-boost engine showed a 17-20 per cent Johnson Matthey.”
system comprising a coil-in-plug unit with reduction of engine-out NOx for a 2-3 per- This project will involve development of
high-ignitability platinum electrodes achieved cent fuel economy penalty over the econo- the concept in a C-segment demonstrator
an increase of over 15 per cent in combus- my-optimised version – clearly a price worth vehicle, and will include a much more rigor-
tion-stable IMEP compared with the standard paying given that aftertreatment for NOx is a ous evaluation of in-vehicle performance and
baseline system. But if the ignition system crucial aspect of this concept. feel. The eagerly-anticipated results of this
offered a clear means of improving combus- The concept was also evaluated based on work should be revealed in mid-2002. ■
tion stability, so too did the opportunity to
develop a dual-injection strategy. A second
injection pulse is used late in the cycle: this,
together with the associated partial stratifica-
tion of the charge, was found to reduce
cycle-to-cycle variations significantly.
The full impact of the LBDI concept can
be appreciated when comparing torque
curves. The similarity of the curves for a 1.2-
litre LBDI engine with variable nozzle tur-
bocharger (VNT) against a typical current-
production 1.6-litre port-fuel-injected (PFI)
gasoline engine demonstrates that downsiz-
ing of 25 per cent on swept volume is clearly
a very practical proposition. However, in
common with all downsized turbocharged
engines, torque at low speed remains the
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