Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

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Energy Conversion and Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

Numerical investigations of combustion and emissions characteristics of a T

novel small scale opposed rotary piston engine fuelled with hydrogen at
wide open throttle and stoichiometric conditions
⁎ ⁎
Jianbing Gaoa,b,c, , Guohong Tiana, , Chaochen Mac, Dhinesh Balasubramaniand, Shikai Xinge,
Phil Jennerf
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering Sciences, University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
b
Institute for Transport Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK
c
School of Mechanical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 10081, China
d
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Mepco Schlenk Engineering College, Sivakasi 626005, India
e
School of Vocational and Technical, Hebei Normal University, Shijiazhuang 050024, China
f
Enigma England Ltd, Kent ME19 5NX, UK

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Popularisations of hybrid vehicles and range extender electric vehicles promote the development of high power
Opposed rotary piston engine density and small scale internal combustion engines. Opposed rotary piston (ORP) engines characterised by
Hydrogen fuel compact designs, few moving parts and high power density are an ideal power source for the above mentioned
Combustion process vehicles. Due to the short cyclic period of the ORP engine, hydrogen fuel was applied to decrease the combustion
In-cylinder pressure
duration. This paper investigated the in-cylinder combustion and emissions characteristics of the hydrogen
NO emissions
fuelled ORP engine using 3D numerical simulation method at various engine speeds and full load conditions. In-
cylinder pressure evolutions, heat release rates, nitrogen monoxide (NO) formations, and power density were
analysed to evaluate the engine performance. The results indicated that volumetric efficiency of this ORP engine
was higher than 88.3% for all the given scenarios, being benefited from large area of intake ports. Peak in-
cylinder pressure decreased significantly with engine speeds, which was mainly resulted from low fuel mass burn
fraction before top dead centre (TDC) for high engine speed conditions. As long as the combustion chambers
passed TDC, combustion flame propagated from the bowls into the gaps between end faces of adjacent pistons
rapidly. In the exhaust stroke, free discharge process of this ORP engine lasted longer duration than re-
ciprocating engines, which would lead to more energy losses. NO was mainly formed after TDC, with the ac-
cumulated NO mass being in the range of 0.07 mg–0.5 mg per cycle per cylinder in the engine speed range of
1000–5000 r/min. Maximum power density and NO emissions factor of this engine fuelled with hydrogen was
approximately 69.2 kW·L−1 and 10.60 g·(kW·h)−1, respectively. Indicated thermal efficiency dropped from
36.2% to 26.5% when the engine speed increased from 1000 to 5000 r/min.

1. Introduction
As concerns are increasing for greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide, CO2)
emissions and hazardous pollutants emitted by on-road vehicles [1,2],
hybrid vehicles and range extender electric vehicles are attracting much
attention [3,4]. Nowadays, power sources of hybrid vehicles and range
extender electric vehicles are dominated by reciprocating internal
combustion (IC) engines. This situation provides a possibility of de-
veloping other types of IC engines having a smaller size, higher power
density, and less CO2 emissions. Wankel engines are characterised by
their compact designs, low engine weight, and high power density; and
they have been applied to some IC engine powered vehicles [5–7]. They
are considered to be a promising power source of hybrid vehicles and
range extender electric vehicles due to their inherent merits [8]. An-
other type of IC engines, opposed rotary piston (ORP) engines, was
appreciated by researchers [9,10] due to their high power density,
smooth rotations, and few moving parts. The cyclic period of four-cy-
linder ORP engines was 360° crank angle (CA), with each stroke lasting
90° CA [11]. The maximum power density of a four-cylinder gasoline
ORP engine was approximately 80.0 kW/L under naturally aspirated

⁎
Corresponding authors at: Department of Mechanical Engineering Sciences, University of Surrey, GU2 7XH, UK (J. Gao).
E-mail addresses: redonggaojianbing@163.com (J. Gao), g.tian@surrey.ac.uk (G. Tian).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2020.113178
Received 27 April 2020; Received in revised form 30 June 2020; Accepted 1 July 2020
0196-8904/ © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
J. Gao, et al.
conditions, as demonstrated by Gao et al. [11] using a 1D simulation
method.
Carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrocarbon (HC) emissions from
Wankel engines are much higher than those of reciprocating engines,
resulting from narrow and long combustion chambers which lead to
much unburned fuel [12,13]; meantime, the brake thermal efficiency of
Wankel engines is low [14,15]. Many researches [16–18] were con-
ducted to ease these disadvantages brought by narrow and long com-
bustion chambers. For example, Abraham and Bracco [19] put forward
an approach of multipoint spark to decrease Wankel engine emissions;
the effectiveness of dual-spark plugs was demonstrated by Ji et al.
[8,20] using 3D numerical simulations. This ignition system consisted
of a leading-spark plug and a trailing-spark plug, which contributed to a
57.6% drop of CO emissions, but an increase of 15.7% for NOx emis-
sions. Applications of dual-spark plug arrangements dropped cycle-to-
cycle variations, contributed to increasing the ignition stability as well.
For ORP engines, dual-spark plugs were usually symmetrically posi-
tioned in the ORP engine blocks, as presented in the work [21] which
also addressed the merits of dual-spark plugs. In the work [21], the
dual-spark plugs were essential to ensure normal in-cylinder combus-
tion.
Hydrogen as a clean energy is considered to be one of the most
promising fuels for IC engines, and many related studies have been
performed from both fundamental theory [22,23] and application trials
[24,25]. Applications of hydrogen fuel are in the process to improve the
overall performance of IC engines [26]. Due to the high flame propa-
gation speed, hydrogen fuel brings many benefits for Wankel engines to
improve brake thermal efficiency and decrease CO and HC emissions
[27,28]. ORP engines will also benefit from the high flame propagation
speed of hydrogen fuel combustion theoretically, because the cyclic
period of ORP engines (both in crank angle and time) is half of the four-
stroke reciprocating engines. Hydrogen fuel could ensure the complete
fuel combustion for ORP engines even at high engine speed conditions.
Recent years, hydrogen was usually as a fuel addition to promote in-
cylinder combustion for better engine performance [29]. As presented
by Akar et al. [30] that a reduction of 2.23% in brake specific fuel
consumption (BSFC) was achieved when hydrogen energy fraction was
12% of total fuel energy (waste oil biodiesel and hydrogen); however, it
led to a 51.8% increase of NOx emissions. The benefits were also de-
monstrated by Amrouche et al. [17] that HC and CO emissions reduced
by 85.5% and 50.0%, respectively when hydrogen energy fraction was
increased from 0% to 18.0%; meantime, CO2 emissions decreased by
32.6%.
Caused by the low hydrogen mass fraction in hydrogen/air mixture,
power density of hydrogen IC engines was lower than that of engines
fuelled with other fuel (e.g. gasoline, diesel, natural gas) [31]. In order
to compensate the power losses of hydrogen engines, Wang et al. [32]
investigated the combustion characteristics of a hydrogen fuelled re-
ciprocating engine after adopting a turbocharger system. The results
indicated that the power density was approximately 24.0 kW/L under
the engine speed of 3500 r/min and the intake manifold pressure of
1.4 bar; and its brake thermal efficiency reached 35.0%. The power
density of Wankel engines and ORP engines fuelled with hydrogen will
still be higher than gasoline fuelled reciprocating engines due to their
inherent structures, especially for ORP engines whose cyclic period was
half of four-stroke reciprocating engines.
ORP engines are free of narrow and long combustion chambers
which lead to high emissions rates and low brake thermal efficiency for
Wankel engines; meantime, intake and exhaust port area of ORP en-
gines can be larger than those of reciprocating engines to ensure high
volumetric efficiency, because their layouts are not limited by spark
plugs and cylinder head size. Operation theory of ORP engines was
described by Chen and Deng [9,10,33] using mathematical equations,
and these researchers were mainly focused on the engine structures and
power delivery systems. Deng et al. [9] analysed the piston rotation
velocity; further, the relations between the power output and piston
2
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
numbers were put forward that engine power output increased with
cylinder number. Additionally, the power density of a naturally aspi-
rated eight-cylinder ORP engine was estimated, and the maximum
value reached 78 kW/L under the engine speed of 2000 r/min [9]. This
power density was at the similar level to the value estimated by Gao
et al. [21]. However, the design of piston number in the work [9]
should consider the combustion duration in time; more cylinders will
lead to less time for each stroke, resulting in low volumetric efficiency
and much unburned fuel. High piston number will lead to a drop of
maximum engine speed to ensure high thermal efficiency theoretically.
In-cylinder combustion and emissions formations should be explored to
evaluate the overall performance of ORP engines.
As a new type of IC engines, few studies about the combustion and
emissions characteristics of ORP engines are available to the authors’
knowledge, especially for the engines fuelled with hydrogen. As the
power stroke of ORP engines both in crank angle and time was much
shorter than reciprocating engines, high flame speed of hydrogen
combustion would benefit much for improving the engine performance.
However, hydrogen applications to IC engines usually caused high NOx
emissions. This paper aims to explore the combustion and emissions
characteristics of a small scale four-cylinder ORP engine fuelled with
hydrogen, using a 3D numerical simulation approach. It makes a
foundation of the applications of ORP engines to hybrid vehicles. The
3D numerical simulations were performed over various engine speeds
and wide open throttle conditions. Discussions were made by the
comparisons of ORP engines to Wankel engines and conventional re-
ciprocating engines, in terms of in-cylinder pressure, heat release rates,
NOx formations, and power density.
2. Materials and methods
This section is organised as the follows: (1) configurations of this
ORP engine are described, and potential benefits are presented from the
view of structures; (2) the operation theory of this ORP engine is ana-
lysed, and comparisons to Wankel and reciprocating engines are made;
(3) the 3D numerical simulation method is described, and the sensi-
tivity analysis of the simulation results is made; (4) the numerical si-
mulation model is roughly validated using experimental tests; (5)
boundary conditions of the simulation scenarios in this paper are de-
scribed.
2.1. Configurations of the opposed rotary piston engine
This ORP engine is a naturally aspirated, four-strokes, and four-
cylinder spark ignition engine which can be fuelled with gasoline,
natural gas, hydrogen and their blends. Its operation process includes
intake stroke, compression stroke, expansion stroke and exhaust stroke,
with each stroke lasting 90° crank angle (CA) and approximately 120°
geometrical angle [11]. This ORP engine is composed of two engine
blocks, four pistons, one exhaust port, three intake ports, two shafts,
and two spark plugs. The specifications of this ORP engine are shown in
Table 1
Specifications of the opposed rotary piston engine.
Specifications Values
Ignition method Spark ignition
Stroke number 4
Cylinder number 4
Spark plug number 2
Intake port number 3
Exhaust port number 1
Compression ratio 9.73
Displacement/ L 0.5468
Intake system Naturally aspirated
Crank angle per stroke/ ° 90
J. Gao, et al.
Fig. 1. Structures of the opposed rotary piston engine, reproduced from authors’ previous work [21].
Table 1. This small scale engine, whose rated power was approximately
40 kW over 5000 r/min when it was fuelled with gasoline [11], has a
displacement of 0.5468 L and a compression ratio of 9.73 which is at
the similar level to spark ignition reciprocating engines.
Configurations of this ORP engine are shown in Fig. 1. More details
and descriptions were presented in the authors’ previous work [21].
Each two pistons are opposed positioned and connected to one shaft
(geometrical angle between the centers of pistons is 180°). As shown in
Fig. 1, pistons 1 and 3 are connected with shaft 1; pistons 2 and 4 are
connected with shaft 2. The combustion chambers are composed of
engine block inner surfaces, shaft surfaces, and end faces (including
bowl surfaces) of two adjacent pistons. It should be noted that piston
positions in Fig. 1 should be adjusted to achieve the correct valve
timing for engine operations. Compared to reciprocating engines, this
ORP engine has a shorter cyclic period (360°CA), indicating a higher
power density in theory under the same engine speed. Due to the short
cyclic period, heat loss is decreased, contributing to increasing thermal
efficiency. There are two bowls in each end face of the pistons, which
allows for a flexibility of spark timing to achieve optimal engine per-
formance. Meantime, the design of two spark plugs can effectively in-
crease the ignition stability and decrease the flame propagation time
compared to the central layout. Shorter flame propagation time con-
duces to decreasing the possibility of engine knock and increasing the
percentage of constant volume combustion. Because hot points, being
one of the main factors leading to engine knock, are commonly gen-
erated around spark plugs and exhaust ports for spark ignition engines;
in this ORP engine, exhaust ports are not exposure to the fuel/air
mixture atmosphere during combustion process. However, the sealing
in this engine maybe an issue caused by the gap between the two shafts.
3
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
2.2. Operation descriptions of the opposed rotary piston engine
The crank angle definition of this ORP engine is different from that
of reciprocating engines whose crank angle is based on the positions of
the engine crankshaft. The end faces of the cylinders in ORP engines
rotate with engine operations; however, only the bottom faces of cy-
linders (top end faces of pistons) move in reciprocating engines. Crank
angle in this ORP engine is defined as the positions of geometrical
centres of the cylinders. Top dead centres (TDCs) and bottom dead
centres (BDCs) are corresponding to the positions where the cylinder
volumes have the minimum value and maximum value, respectively, as
shown in Fig. 2. In this paper, “TDC 1” is 0° CA and “BDC 1” is 90° CA.
“TDC 1” is near the spark plugs. The detailed operation process of this
engine is shown in Video 1. In the video, only one combustion chamber
operation was included because of the limitations of the authors’
workstation capability of generating video. Different from Wankel en-
gines and reciprocating engines, there are not any overlaps for intake
and exhaust ports, which could significantly ease the backfire phe-
nomenon if hydrogen is applied. The volume evolutions for each two
opposed cylinders are the same (see Fig. 3). During the engine opera-
tion process, the three intake ports open successively after pistons pass
the exhaust port; however, at most two intake ports can work si-
multaneously.
2.3. Numerical simulation model
Fluid domains and computational meshes of the 3D numerical si-
mulation model are shown in Fig. 4, and the individual mesh numbers
are presented in Table 2. The discretised domains of the ORP engine are
composed of three intake pipes, two spark plugs, one exhaust pipe, and
J. Gao, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

Table 2
Mesh numbers of fluid domains and overall mesh quality.
Sub-domain Elements

Intake pipe 1 12210

Intake pipe 2 12210
Intake pipe 3 16632
Exhaust pipe 40664
Spark plug (each one) 18202
Bowl (each one) 37718
Cylinder (initial stage) 53376
Minimum orthogonal 0.337
Maximum ortho skew 0.663
Maximum aspect ratio 16.726

continuously during engine operations, which results in the changes of

mesh numbers. To ensure the mesh quality of the cylinder domains,
dynamic meshes are employed in the unsteady simulations. Sensitivities
analysis of the mesh number and calculation residuals were conducted
in the authors’ previous work, where mesh number of 2710453 and
calculation residuals of 10−6 were chosen [21]. Based on the authors
previous investigations [21], the valve timing was adjusted to make the
intake ports slightly late opening to avoid the backflow.
Fig. 2. TDCs and BDCs of this opposed rotary piston engine. In this simulation model, the ignition of hydrogen/air mixture is
achieved by patching high temperature zones (2773 K) at the positions
of spark plugs, which may cause some differences between simulation
Combustion chambers 2/4 (1): intake (2): compression and experiment results. The patched area was the same size as the
0.20 Combustion chambers 1/3 (3): power (4): exhaust 0.20
section surface of spark plugs. As long as small amounts of hydrogen/air
(1) (2) (3) (4) (1) mixture flow into the zone, the mixture will be ignited and the flame
0.16 0.16
will propagated into other regions of combustion chambers. Its function
is slightly similar to pre-ignition chambers in diesel engines. This
Volume/ L

Volume/ L

0.12 0.12
method may slightly accelerate the in-cylinder combustion compared to
real spark plugs. The patched high temperature zones (spark plug zones
0.08 0.08
in the engine model) are rotated slightly to the direction of piston ro-
tations to provide correct spark timing, as shown in Fig. 5. The effect of
0.04 0.04
air exchange (see P-V diagrams in the results and discussion) and re-
sidual exhaust gas were considered in the simulation. Exhaust gas re-
0.00 (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) 0.00
mained in the combustion chambers especially the bowls decreased the
0 200 400 600 800 1000 quantity of fresh hydrogen/air mixture, further affecting engine per-
-5 formance such as engine power output and thermal efficiency.
Time step/ 10 s
In this paper, ANSYS FLUENT [34] software is used to simulate the
Fig. 3. Combustion chamber volume evolutions. unsteady flow in the ORP engine, including pressure evolutions, heat
release, and NOx formations in the combustion chambers. ANSYS
FLUENT is based on the finite volume method. Renormalization group
four combustion chambers (including four bowls and one cylinder for
(RNG) k-epsilon model is applied, which improves the accuracy of
each one). Hexahedral meshes are applied to all the domains and then
predicting rapidly strained flows and swirling flows. Solver settings
converted to unstructured meshes. Cylinder volumes change

Fig. 4. Computational domains and meshes of this engine.

4
J. Gao, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

during the simulations are presented in Table 3. Due to a lack of carbon

element in hydrogen fuel, only thermal NOx is formed during com-
bustion process. The effect of patched temperature of the spark zones on
the cylinder pressure is shown in Fig. 6. The patched temperature was
2773 K and 2673 K for the two scenarios, respectively. The patched
temperature presented a significant effect on the simulation results, and
2773 K was used in the simulation. The patched temperature was si-
milar to the spark energy, and it would be discussed in the authors’
future work.

2.4. Boundary conditions of simulation scenarios

The purpose of this paper focuses on the combustion characteristics

and NOx formations over various engine rotation speeds. Table 4 shows
the boundary conditions of the simulation scenarios. Time step setting
is different for various engine rotation speeds due to the cyclic period in
time changing with engine speeds. In the simulations of this paper, one
cyclic period includes one thousand time steps for all the scenarios.

3. Results and discussion

In this section, combustion and emissions characteristics of this ORP

engine fuelled with hydrogen will be explored under various engine
speeds and wide open throttle conditions.
Fig. 5. Patched high temperature zones.
3.1. Combustion characteristics
Table 3
Solver and hydrogen/air mixture properties settings in FLUENT software. Volumetric efficiency of IC engines significantly affects engine
Specifications Descriptions
performance, such as engine power output, brake specific fuel con-
sumption (BSFC), and brake thermal efficiency. Table 5 shows the vo-
Viscous model k-epsilon RNG model lumetric efficiency of this ORP engine for the given scenarios. Volu-
Reactions Volumetric metric efficiency of this engine was higher than 88.3% with the
Species model Species transport
maximum value reaching up to 93.6%, which was benefited from large
Reaction of hydrogen/air mixture Finite-rate/Eddy-dissipation
Density of hydrogen/air mixture Real gas area of intake ports. Overall volumetric efficiency of this ORP engine
Specific heat of hydrogen/air mixture Mixing law was higher than that of reciprocating engines [35,36]. Because intake
Viscosity of hydrogen/air mixture Mass weighted mixing law port layout of the ORP engine was not limited by cylinder head area,
NOx model Thermal NOx
exhaust ports, and spark plugs, which was greatly different from re-
Pressure-velocity coupling Simple
Transient formulation First order implicit
ciprocating engines. Due to a lower velocity (lower momentum) of
Spatial discretization Gradient Least squares cell based hydrogen/air mixture in intake pipes over 1000 r/min engine speed,
less mixture flowed into the cylinders at the end of intake stroke. But a
Pressure Standard lower engine speed allowed more time for the intake process. Volu-
Density Second order upwind
metric efficiency was a balance of mixture velocity and intake duration
Momentum Second order upwind
Turbulent kinetic energy First order upwind in time, resulting in volumetric efficiency increasing and then de-
Turbulent dissipation rate First order upwind creasing with engine speeds.
Energy Second order upwind Average in-cylinder pressure evolutions of this ORP engine over
various engine speeds are presented in Fig. 7. Peak in-cylinder pressure
of this engine decreased significantly with engine speeds, and the value
over 1000 r/min was approximately 49.3 bar which was higher than
the Wankel engine used by Chen et al. [37]. Peak in-cylinder pressure of
a Wankel engine fuelled with natural gas was approximately 46.0 bar,
and its corresponding crank angle was around 15° CA after TDC [37].
Such high in-cylinder pressure of the ORP engine was benefited from
high propagation speed of hydrogen flame. This advantage of hydrogen
combustion was also used to improve the brake thermal efficiency of
fossil fuel engines by blending hydrogen with other types of fuel. The
merits were demonstrated by the fact that peak in-cylinder pressure
increased from 18.0 bar to 24.0 bar when hydrogen energy additions
increased from 0% to 18.0%; and their corresponding crank angle was
advanced from 30° to 5° CA after TDC [17]. However, hydrogen addi-
tions showed a limited effect on indicated mean effective pressure
(IMEP) for a lean-burn situation (equivalent ratio of 0.45) when the
hydrogen addition was less than 6.0% [38]. Lean-burn was usually used
to achieve low NOx emissions and high thermal efficiency; however,
spark timing or fuel injection timing should be slightly earlier than that
of stoichiometric situations, especially for high engine speed conditions.
Fig. 6. The effect of patched temperature on in-cylinder pressure. The peak in-cylinder pressure of this ORP engine decreased to lower

5
J. Gao, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

Table 4
Boundary conditions of CFD simulations.
Boundary conditions Scenario 1 Scenario 2 Scenario 3 Scenario 4 Scenario 5

Intake pressure/ bar 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0

Intake temperature/ K 293 293 293 293 293
Outlet pressure/ bar 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0
Rotation speed/ r·min−1 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000
Throttle opening 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%
Fuel type H2 H2 H2 H2 H2
Equivalence ratio of mixture 1 1 1 1 1
Cyclic period in time/ s 0.06 0.03 0.02 0.015 0.012
Time step/ s 6 × 10−5 3 × 10−5 2 × 10−5 1.5 × 10−5 1.2 × 10−5

Table 5
Volumetric efficiency over various engine speeds.
Engine speed/ r·min−1 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000
Volumetric efficiency/ % 88.3 90.7 93.6 92.7 91.7
than 30.0 bar when the engine speed increased to 5000 r/min. Crank
angle corresponding to the peak in-cylinder pressure increased slightly
with engine speeds, and it was around 10° CA after TDC, being slightly
earlier than reciprocating engines fuelled with natural gas [37]. Ad-
ditionally, in-cylinder pressure of the ORP engine at the end of power
stroke increased with engine speeds. Both lower peak in-cylinder
pressure and higher discharge pressure for high engine speeds could
lead to lower indicated thermal efficiency. In this paper, spark timing
was the same for the five cases. Low peak in-cylinder pressure over
5000 r/min for this ORP engine was mainly caused by late spark timing
which showed a significant effect on the peak in-cylinder pressure, as
demonstrated in a spark ignition engine [39]. The corresponding crank
angle was advanced from 35° to 22° CA after TDC when spark timing
was advanced from 9° to 13° CA before TDC [39]. In addition, the crank
angle of 90% mass burn fraction of fuel was advanced from 60° to 40°
CA after TDC. The discharge pressure of the given scenarios in this
paper was approximately 6.0 bar which was consistent with the pub-
lished work [17]. Maximum pressure increase rates happened before
TDC for these cases, and it decreased from 3.2 to 1.5 bar/ °CA when the
engine speed increased from 1000 to 5000 r/min. Hydrogen applica-
tions to IC engines promoted the combustion, which enhanced the
possibility of engine knock. Seen from Fig. 7, P-V lines were smooth and
there was not a sharp increase of pressure increase rate in the com-
bustion process, which indicated that no obvious knock happened for
these scenarios.
Fig. 8 shows pressure distributions in combustion chambers over
various engine speeds. Maximum pressure difference in combustion
chambers during combustion was smaller than 1.0 bar. Pressure in the
bowls was higher than other regions at the beginning of combustion
process, because combustion mainly happened in the bowls. Combus-
tion was spread into other regions (gaps between the end faces of ad-
jacent pistons) quickly as long as combustion chambers passed TDC; in-
cylinder pressure became more evenly distributed with engine opera-
tions in the combustion process. At the end of the compression stroke,
gaps between the end faces of adjacent pistons were narrow, and the
temperature of the end faces was low. It prevented flame from propa-
gating into the gaps, which was mainly caused by quenching effect and
crevice effect [40], further resulting in low combustion rates before
TDC. However, the combustion rates increased significantly once the
expansion process started. It contributed to dropping the peak in-cy-
linder temperature, further decreasing NOx formations.
In-cylinder pressure evolutions were mainly caused by heat release
of hydrogen/air combustion. Fig. 9 shows the heat release rates of these
five scenarios. Maximum values were in the range of 18–27 J·(°CA)−1,
and they were corresponding to 3° CA before TDC to 15° CA after TDC.
The crank angle (3° CA before TDC) under 1000 r/min was slightly
earlier than reciprocating engines fuelled with gasoline due to high
propagation speed of hydrogen flame. For the real engine operations,
the crank angle corresponding to the maximum heat release rates was
also affected by engine torque output (load). It was demonstrated by the
fact that the crank angle was retarded from 6° to 9° CA after TDC when
brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) increased from 3.87 to 11.63 bar
over an engine speed of 1600 r/min and an equivalent ratio of 1.3 [41].
Heat of reaction could reflect the flame propagation to some extent.
Fig. 10 shows the distributions of the heat of reaction in combustion
chambers. Since two spark plugs (patched high temperature zones)
were used to ignite hydrogen/air mixture, flame started from the two
upstream bowls of combustion chambers. It took short time for flame
propagating from the bowls to the gaps between the end faces of ad-
jacent pistons in the power stroke. Flame hardly propagated into the
gaps before TDC, due to the low temperature of the regions and end

Fig. 7. Average in-cylinder pressure over various engine speeds.

6
J. Gao, et al.
Fig. 8. Pressure distributions in combustion chambers over various engine speeds (high resolution images in Fig. S1).
Fig. 9. Heat release rates over various engine speeds.
faces of pistons.
Heat release rates during combustion were dependent on mass burn
fraction of hydrogen versus crank angle, further affecting engine per-
formance including indicated thermal efficiency, in-cylinder tempera-
ture, and NOx formations. Mass burn fraction of hydrogen in the
7
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
combustion process is shown in Fig. 11. Little hydrogen was burned
before TDC for high engine speed scenarios due to short cyclic period in
time. Mass burn fraction before TDC of a Wankel engine fuelled with
hydrogen under 3000 r/min and lean-burn conditions [17] was higher
than that of this ORP engine. It was demonstrated by the test data that
mass burn fraction of hydrogen before TDC was in the range of 10%
~20%. It was corresponding to 17 ~ 27° CA after TDC for 90% mass
burn fraction [17], which was slightly earlier than that of authors’
work. It seemed the flame propagation from bowls to the gaps between
the end faces of adjacent pistons was affected by engine speeds. Seen
from Fig. 10, flame had a high possibility of propagating from the right
bowls at low engine speed conditions; however, it was from the left
bowls at high engine speed conditions. It was further demonstrated by
mass fraction distributions, as shown in Fig. 12. Hydrogen in the corner
and cylinder top was the latest to be burned due to a long flame pro-
pagation distance.
In this sub-section, 10% mass burn fraction (MBF10) of hydrogen
was defined as the start point of combustion; the crank angle position
for 50% MBF (MBF50) was defined as combustion phasing; the crank
angle duration between MBF10 and 90% mass burn fraction (MBF90)
was defined as combustion duration. MBF10 ranged from 5° CA before
TDC to 4°CA after TDC, and it was 4 ~ 15°CA after TDC for MBF50.
Combustion duration of hydrogen/air mixture was in the range of
20 ~ 38° CA for these five scenarios (see Fig. 13). As the short duration
of power stroke for this ORP engine, a higher mass burn fraction should
J. Gao, et al.
Fig. 10. Heat of reaction distributions in combustion chambers over various engine speeds (high resolution images in Fig. S2).
Fig. 11. Mass burn fractions of hydrogen over various engine speeds.
be obtained before TDC for high engine speed conditions to achieve
high in-cylinder pressure and high thermal efficiency. The crank angle
corresponding to the peak in-cylinder pressure and MBF90 was earlier
than that of reciprocating spark ignition engines [42]. It was partly
8
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
caused by high propagation speed of hydrogen flame, as indirectly
demonstrated by the work [43] that the gasoline/hydrogen blend fuel
was burned out in 50° CA for a Wankel engine; however, it was more
than 250° CA if the Wankel engine was fuelled with gasoline under the
same condition. Even though the absolute crank angle of combustion
duration was short, it accounted for almost one third of the stroke
duration, which prevented the increase of engine thermal efficiency.
P-V diagram was a direct method to compare indicated thermal
efficiency and work output per cycle for the same engine, as shown in
Fig. 14. It should be noted that pressure profiles in Fig. 7 was slightly
smoothed. The area covered by P-V lines for 1000 r/min was much
bigger than that of 5000 r/min, which implied low indicated thermal
efficiency. Because of short combustion duration in time for 5000 r/
min, little hydrogen was burned before TDC, which led to the lowest
peak in-cylinder pressure. In this paper, spark timing was the same for
these five scenarios. In order to increase the indicated power output and
indicated thermal efficiency of this engine, spark timing should be
advanced for high engine speed scenarios. Discharge pressure increased
slightly with engine speeds, and it was higher than 5.0 bar at the be-
ginning of the exhaust stroke. Discharge process included free discharge
and forced discharge. Free discharge process lasted long duration, and
its corresponding changes of combustion chamber volume ranged from
0.035 to 0.07 L, which indicated high energy losses. For reciprocating
engines, the in-cylinder pressure could drop to a low level in short
J. Gao, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

Fig. 12. Hydrogen mass fraction distributions in combustion chambers over various engine speeds (high resolution images in Fig. S3).

Fig. 13. Start of combustion, combustion phasing, and combustion duration.

duration of exhaust stroke [44], being benefitted from early opening of
exhaust valves. Compared to reciprocating engines, both Wankel en-
gines and ORP engines had long duration of free discharge process,
which was demonstrated in the work [45]. In the future work, the
discharge port area should be enlarged to make it early opening.
However, the early opening should not be large to ensure complete
Fig. 14. P-V diagrams over various engine speeds.
combustion for high thermal efficiency and low exhaust emissions,
especially for gasoline and natural gas fuelled situations. For the current
intake and discharge port structures, it was more suitable for turbo-
charged engines due to a lack of early opening of intake ports and late

9
J. Gao, et al.
Fig. 15. NO formation during hydrogen combustion over various engine
speeds.
closing of the exhaust ports; additionally, turbocharger could com-
pensate the power losses caused by hydrogen combustion. Heat radia-
tion losses were neglected in the simulation, such that the area covered
by P-V lines in real tests should be smaller than those in Fig. 14. Due to
the highest in-cylinder temperature (presented in next sub-section) for
1000 r/min, heat radiation losses were the highest among the five
Fig. 16. Distributions of NO mass fraction in combustion chambers over various engine speeds (high resolution images in Fig. S5).
10
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
cases.
3.2. Emissions characteristics
Combustion temperature of hydrogen fuel was higher than that of
gasoline and natural gas under similar operation conditions, which led
to higher NOx emissions for hydrogen combustion than other types of
fuels in theory. In this sub-section, NOx formations and distributions in
combustion chambers are presented.
Pollutants formed in hydrogen combustion process were NOx (in-
cluding NO and NO2) generally, among which more than 98% was NO
if fuel/air mixture was stoichiometric. Zeldovitch [46] mechanism was
used in FLUENT code to estimate NOx formations, and NO formation
process was shown in Equations (1) ~ 3. Fig. 15 shows accumulated NO
and its formation rates in the engine operation process. It indicated that
most of NO was formed after TDC, and the accumulated NO reached the
maximum value in the range of 10 ~ 20° CA after TDC for these cases.
Peak values of NO formation rates decreased greatly with engine
speeds, being corresponding to the crank angle of 5 ~ 15° CA after TDC.
Accumulated NO decreased significantly with engine speeds; and it was
approximately 0.5 mg per cycle per chamber over 1000 r/min, being
almost seven times higher than that of 5000 r/min. NO mole fraction
was also presented in Fig. S4, which showed that NO concentration
under low engine speed conditions was higher than gasoline engines
[47,48]. The maximum NO concentration of a reciprocating engine
J. Gao, et al.
fuelled with hydrogen over wide open throttle conditions reached ap-
proximately 1200 ppm [49]. For low engine speed scenarios, accumu-
lated NO increased to the maximum value and then decreased; how-
ever, it was constant after reaching the maximum value for high speed
conditions. It was consistent with the test results [46] that NO mole
fraction during hydrogen combustion increased and then decreased
with crank angle. A decrease of NO concentration with residence time
during combustion was also observed in the work [50]. Seen from
equations (1) ~ 3, NO formation was a reversible process. Large
amounts of NO formation under low engine speed conditions ac-
celerated the backward reactions, resulting in a decrease after the peak
value. Hydrogen additions in fossil fuel contributed to more NOx for-
mation, as demonstrated by Karagöz [51] under idle conditions that
NOx emissions increase was 4.6%, 6.2%, 27.7% and 44.6% compared to
pure gasoline when hydrogen additions were 5%, 8%, 10% and 15%,
respectively. In order to decrease NO formation during hydrogen
combustion, spark timing should be slightly retarded for low speed
conditions to decrease the maximum in-cylinder temperature although
it would lead to power losses. Lean-burn [52] and exhaust gas re-
circulation (EGR) [53] could also effectively prevent NO formation. In
addition, internal EGR could be achieved by intake port layout.
N + NO ⇋ N2 + O (1)
N + O2 ⇋ NO + O (2)
N + OH ⇋ NO + H (3)
NO mass fraction distributions in combustion chambers during en-
gine operations are shown in Fig. 16. Maximum NO mass fraction in
combustion chambers were approximately 0.025. NO formation was
spread from the bowls to the gaps between end faces of adjacent pis-
tons. The distributions of NO formation were quite similar to the dis-
tributions of heat of reaction. For high engine speed conditions, NO
mass fraction was quite low even in the bowls.
As one of the main factors contributing to NO formation during
hydrogen combustion, average in-cylinder temperature could partly
explain the NO formation during stoichiometric hydrogen/air mixture
combustion. As shown in the Fig. 17, in-cylinder temperature increased
greatly after TDC, then reached the maximum value around 10 ~ 25°
CA after TDC. Most of NO was formed after average in-cylinder tem-
perature being higher than 1600 K. Temperature distributions in
combustion chambers are shown in Fig. 18. It was consistent with the
distributions of heat of reaction and NO formation. Average in-cylinder
temperature of the ORP engine was higher than that of reciprocating
engines fuelled with gasoline or gasoline/hydrogen blends [54], leading
to more NO formation at low engine speed conditions.
Fig. 17. In-cylinder temperature during combustion over various engine
speeds.
11
Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178
3.3. Knock prediction
Hydrogen combustion increased the possibility of engine knock.
Knock evaluation of the ORP engine in this section was referred to the
work by Nishchay Sharma [55]. In that work, three knock prediction
models were described; they were based on Arrhenius function, che-
mical kinetics, and thermodynamics, respectively. Arrhenius function
based model was used to predict the engine knock in this paper. In this
method, ignition delay time was used to represent the knock possibility.
The shorter of the ignition delay time, the higher possibility of the
engine knock would be. Ignition delay time was a time-dependent
quantity, as shown in Equation (4),
ON 3.402 −1.7 3800
τ = 17.68( ) P exp ( )
100 Tu (4)
Where, τ is ignition delay time (ms); ON is octane number of fuel
(130 for hydrogen fuel); P, instantaneous cylinder pressure (bar); Tu,
unburned zone temperature (K). The ignition delay time changed
continuously in the process of in-cylinder combustion. In this section,
the minimum value of ignition delay time for each case was used to
evaluate the knock possibility, as presented in Table 6. Minimum ig-
nition delay time decreased significantly with engine speeds, which was
consistent with the work presented by Nishchay Sharma [55] that
knock usually happened at low engine speed and high load conditions.
Please note that the calculated values in Table 6 were corresponding to
5° CA after TDC, with the assumption that the combustion only hap-
pened in the bowls. It would generate some error for the results.
3.4. Performance evaluations
Summary of the engine performance calculated using the 3D nu-
merical simulation results is listed in Table 7. Peak in-cylinder pressure
and temperature were approximately 49.4 bar and 2559.9 K, respec-
tively. Maximum indicated power density of this engine was approxi-
mately 69.2 kW/L which was much higher than reciprocating engines
fuelled with hydrogen [32], gasoline [56], and natural gas [57]. In-
dicated thermal efficiency decreased from 36.2% to 26.5% when the
engine speed increased from 1000 to 5000 r/min. The value under low
engine speed conditions was at a similar level to reciprocating engines
[58]; however, it was lower for high engine speeds, being caused by late
spark timing. In this simulation, leakage was neglected due to an early
research stage. In this authors’ opinion, leakage was mainly caused by
the gaps between the two shafts, which would have a negative effect on
the indicated thermal efficiency. As can be seen, the engine torque
decreased with engine speed, which did not conduce to vehicle accel-
eration at high velocity. Turbocharger systems would be helpful to in-
crease the engine torque at high engine speeds. NO emissions factors
were in the range of 2.16 ~ 10.60 g·(kW·h)−1, and the effect of engine
speed on NO emissions factors was different from that of reciprocating
engines. NO emissions factors were much higher than gasoline engines
and natural gas engines [57] for low engine speed conditions; however,
it was lower for high engine speeds. Because the in-cylinder tempera-
ture of this ORP engine over high engine speeds was much lower than
that of low engine speed cases; the combustion duration in time was too
short under high engine speed scenarios to form large amounts of NO.
In the hydrogen/air combustion process, only thermal NO was formed
because there were no carbon and nitrogen elements in hydrogen fuel.
The formation process of thermal NO was much slower than prompt NO
(formed under the existence of HC).
4. Conclusion
Opposed rotary piston engines as a promising power source of hy-
brid vehicles and range extender electric vehicles were investigated to
explore combustion and emissions characteristics when hydrogen was
applied to the engine. This investigation made a foundation of
J. Gao, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 221 (2020) 113178

Fig. 18. Temperature distributions in combustion chambers over various engine speeds (high resolution images in Fig. S6).

Table 6 approximately 93.6% which was benefited from large intake port
Minimum ignition delay time in the combustion process. area. Peak in-cylinder pressure was 49.3 bar for 1000 r/min, being
Engine speed/ r·min−1 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000
corresponding to the crank angle of 10°CA after TDC. Peak in-cy-
linder pressure increase rates for various engine speeds were in the
Minimum ignition delay/ ms 4.4 10.5 19.4 23.3 25.4 range of 1.5 ~ 3.2 bar/° CA, and they happened before TDC.
Pressure difference in combustion chambers during combustion
process was smaller than 1.0 bar.
Table 7 (2) Peak heat release rates of the given scenarios were in the range of
Summary of engine performance calculated using 3D simulation.
18 ~ 27 J·(°CA)−1, and they were corresponding to 3°CA before
Engine speed/ r·min−1 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 TDC to 15°CA after TDC. Little hydrogen fuel was burned before
TDC for high engine speed conditions, which partly led to low peak
Peak in-cylinder pressure/ bar 49.3 45.2 41.0 35.6 29.8
in-cylinder pressure. Combustion duration of this engine fuelled
Peak in-cylinder temperature/ K 2559.9 2473.9 2366.8 2305.8 2203.4
Indicated power output/ kW 10.7 20.7 29.42 35.8 37.8 with hydrogen was in the range of 22 ~ 30 °CA for the engine speed
Indicated power density/ kW·L−1 19.6 37.8 53.8 65.6 69.2 of 1000 ~ 5000 r/min under wide open throttle conditions, such
Indicated thermal efficiency/ % 36.2 35.8 35.1 31.8 26.5 short duration was benefited from high flame propagation speed.
Torque/ N·m 102.4 98.7 93.7 85.6 72.3
(3) Area covered by P-V lines decreased significantly with engine
NO emissions rates/ mg·s−1 32.9 49.3 44.6 38.1 22.7
NO emissions factors/ g·(kW·h)−1 11.03 8.59 5.46 3.83 2.16
speeds, and the discharge pressure at the start of exhaust stroke was
higher than 5.0 bar for these five scenarios. Higher engine speed led
to longer duration of free discharge process, with its corresponding
hydrogen ORP engine applications to hybrid vehicles and range ex- maximum volume change being 0.07 L, which resulted in higher
tender electric vehicles. The main conclusions are as the follows: energy losses.
(4) Accumulated NO decreased from 0.5 to 0.07 mg per cycle per cy-
(1) Volumetric efficiency of this ORP engine increased and then de- linder when engine speed increased from 1000 to 5000 r/min;
creased with engine speeds, with the maximum value being meantime, accumulated NO increased and then decreased with

12
J. Gao, et al.
engine operations in combustion process for low engine speed
conditions. NO distributions in combustion chambers were con-
sistent with those of temperature and heat of reaction.
(5) Maximum indicated power density of this naturally aspirated ORP
engine fuelled with hydrogen was approximately 69.2 kW/L over
5000 r/min; maximum NO emissions factor was 10.6 g·(kW·h)−1
and was corresponding to 1000 r/min; indicated thermal efficiency
was in the range of 26.5%~36.2%, and the value under high engine
speed conditions could be improved by optimising spark timing.
As can be seen from this research, NOx emissions of hydrogen
fuelled ORP engine are high at low speed conditions. In the authors’
future work, lean-burn of this ORP engine at low speed conditions will
be investigated to achieve low NOx emission factors. Turbocharger
systems will be applied to this engine to compensate the power loss due
to low mass fraction of hydrogen/air mixture. Additionally, the optimal
spark timing under medium and high engine speed conditions will be
explored considering the balance between power output and NOx
emissions.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Jianbing Gao: Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology,
Resources, Validation, Visualization, Writing - original draft, Writing -
review & editing. Guohong Tian: Conceptualization, Funding acquisi-
tion, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software,
Supervision, Visualization, Writing - review & editing. Chaochen Ma:
Investigation, Writing - review & editing. Dhinesh Balasubramanian:
Writing - review & editing. Shikai Xing: Visualization, Writing - review
& editing. Phil Jenner: Conceptualization.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influ-
ence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to appreciate the funding support from
EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account project “Numerical simulation of a
rotary range extender”; Hebei Natural Science Foundation Project
(E2019205043); Key Scientific and Technological Research Projects of
Colleges and Universities in Hebei Province (ZD2019076); Technology
Innovation Pre-research Project of Hebei Normal University
(L2019K07).
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2020.113178.
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