Experimental investigation on four strokes

catalytic coated spark ignition (SI) engine

Cite as: AIP Conference Proceedings 2161, 020041 (2019); https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5127632
Published Online: 02 October 2019

Y. Sureshbabu, P. Ashokavarthnan, S. Balasubramani, and V. Naveenprabhu

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AIP Conference Proceedings 2161, 020041 (2019); https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5127632 2161, 020041

© 2019 Author(s).
 Experimental Investigation on Four Strokes Catalytic
Coated Spark Ignition (SI) Engine

Y.Sureshbabu1,a), P.Ashokavarthnan2, S.Balasubramani3 and V.Naveenprabhu4

1, 3,4
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sri Eshwar College of Engineering Coimbatore, India
2
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sri Krishna College of Engineering & Technology Coimbatore, India
a)
Corresponding author: sureshbabu.y@sece.ac.in

Abstract. The future of automobile internal combustion (IC) engine facing twin challenges due to emission norms and
improving engine performance. Hence it is very important to identify some technique to reduce the emission level and also
to improve the engine performance. Catalytic coating is one of the most suitable techniques for reduction of pollution level
and increase the engine efficiency. In this paper, the investigations carried out in the single cylinder catalytic coated four
stroke spark ignition (SI) engine is discussed in detail. The engine combustion chamber and piston crown were coated by
copper (catalyst). The performance of catalytic coated engine various parameters such as torque, brake power at different
engine speed conditions measured by using two wheeler chassis dynamometer. In this investigation the comparative study
also were carried out for copper coated engine with conventional (Un-coated) SI engine and the results showed that copper
coated engine has significant reduction of the carbon monoxide (CO), Hydrocarbon (HC), and Carbon dioxide (CO2) level
compare to conventional engine (uncoated) emission levels.

INTRODUCTION

In a fast growing countries like India and the other countries the gross domestic product (GDP) growth is
depend upon automobile industry vehicle production rate. At present condition most of the automobile vehicles run
by internal combustion (IC)engine, because of lesser initial cost, ease maintenance and more suitable for long run
and heavy duty applications. This IC engine may not be used another century year due to air pollution problems.
Automotive pollutant is one of the main reasons for global warming problems, climate changing and physical
condition issues to human life and hence control of these toxins is very essential. The petrol engine produced main
toxins are carbon monoxide (CO), un burnt hydrocarbons (HC) and oxides of nitrogen(NOX).Catalytic coating is
one of the effective solutions to solve these kinds of problem with minor modification in the SI engine. Karim and
Kibrya (1986) conducted an investigation for emission reduction of IC engine they investigated eight different
catalysts materials. In the experimental test they used eight catalysts in the form of wire mesh were positioned in a
cylindrical chamber and they found that copper and platinum showed better results. Based on the results they
further suggested that IC engine performance and emission reduction could be improved if the catalyst was coated
in the piston crown and combustion chamber. In this present investigation copper is used as a catalytic coating
material. The copper is coated over to engine piston top portion crown and inside portion of the combustion
chamber with the thickness of 300 microns. After conduct the experimental investigation the results showed that
copper coated engine has significant reduction of carbon monoxide (CO), Hydrocarbon (HC), and Carbon dioxide
(CO2) level and increased the brake power marginally compare to conventional engine days.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Copper is good catalyst and also good conductor of heat and combustion with lesser material cost compare to
other catalyst materials like platinum, palladium and rhodium. Nedunchezhian et al.(2000) investigated the
performance of a two-stroke copper coated engine . In this investigation the piston was coated by copper material
with coating of thickness 300 microns. After the investigation, the results showed that copper coating imply to
improve the specific fuel consumption by 4% at full load operation condition and also significant reduction of

Renewable Energy Sources and Technologies

AIP Conf. Proc. 2161, 020041-1–020041-7; https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5127632
Published by AIP Publishing. 978-0-7354-1906-3/$30.00

020041-1
 pollutants.
Kishore et al. (2006) conducted a investigation on catalytic coated gasoline engine .In this investigation a
catalytic converter also used for reduce the emissions further as an after treatment system. In this investigation,
kerosene was used a fuel .The kerosene was blended with gasoline at different 10%, 20% and 30 % levels. In this
investigation the piston and cylinder head coated by copper with thickness of 400 microns. After the investigation,
the result shows that copper coated engine with catalytic converter significantly reduced pollutants when compared
to conventional engine. Ponnusamy et al. (2011) conducted an investigation for catalytic coated spark ignition
engines. Based on the catalytic coating 25.3 % brake thermal efficiency was improved compare to un-coated
engine at higher loads.

COPPER COATING METHOD

Coating of piston could be done by different techniques namely physical vapour deposition and chemical vapour
deposition, thermal spraying and electroplating etc., By comparing various coating techniques thermal spray
process is ergonomic, economical and eco friendly and also the coating should not peeled due to combustion heat
.Plasma spray is the most versatile of the thermal spray processes. In plasma spray process, the piston coating
operation temperature is 1900°C. So, plasma coating can with stand at high temperature conditions and coating not
damaged due to heat produced by IC engine combustion.

FIGURE 1. Plasma coating process

In plasma spray devices, an arc is produced with help of plasma forming gas in between anode and cathode as
shown in the fig.1. Which is normally consists argon / helium. In this process 25 micron size copper powder was fed
in front of the flame. So copper powder was converted into molten stage by means of heat .This molten metal
injected and sprayed on to piston crown and combustion chamber walls and formed a coating with the help of
plasma spray gun.

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 TABLE 1. Plasma coating process parameters
S.No Description Pressure (Psi) Flow Rate L/Min
1 Gun(3MB) - -
2 Nozzle - -
3 Argon 10-120 80-90
4 Hydrogen 50 15-18
5 Amps 500 -
6 Volts 60-70 -
50-53
7 Carrier gas(nitrogen) 60-70dial reading
4 mp/flow
8 Powder feeder 60-70gram/min -
9 Spray distance 3-5inches -

PLASMA COATING METHOD

In plasma coating process several steps were involved during the copper coating of piston crown and combustion
chamber. It is discussed in step by step process below in fig.2. And un-coated, coated piston is shown in Fig.3and
fig.4.

Step 1
• Cleaning

Step 2
• Masking

Step 3
• Sand blasting

Step 4
• Bond coating

Step 5
• Top coating

Step 6
• Remove masking

FIGURE 2. Plasma coating process flowchart

FIGURE 3. Before and after copper coating FIGURE 4. Coated on piston and head

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 EXPERIMENTAL SETUP

The experimental investigation was carried out by using chassis dynamometer for single cylinder four stroke 150cc
Bajaj two wheeler engines, the specification of chassis dynamometers are given below.

TABLE 2. Specification of chassis dynamometer

S.NO Specifications Range

1 Maximum Power 50 kW absorption/motoring
2 Maximum Speed 200 km/hr
3 Maximum Tractive Effort 2233 N
4 Vehicle Inertia Range 100-450kg for two wheelers
5 Roller Diameter 610 mm
6 Width over rollers 1900 mm

FIGURE 5. Experimental setup

Initially the vehicle was loaded on the test rig. The front wheel was locked because of the centre of the rear wheel
rest on the roller circumference and secured the chain on the seat and locked properly for safety concern. After that
RPM probe was fitted on the high tension lead from the spark plug and started the chassis dynamometer by clicking
the shortcut on the desktop of the PC. The main menu was open. By click the triangle icon on the menu or press F5.
A message screens was popup informed to start and WARMUP. At that moment the two wheeler engine was started
and kept it in neutral gear and WARMED UP for few minutes. Following file name was entered and pressed the
START icon. The vehicle gear gradually shifted to the top gear and accelerated the engine to the maximum speed
subsequent pressed the clutch and released the acceleration lever and waited till roller stopped. Finally the results
were stored in the computer.

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 RESULT AND DISCUSSION

Based on the experimental work, the results were tabulated. From the results it was clearly showed the definite
improvement in brake power and torque with respect to speed. The variation of wheel speed, the maximum power
11.2 KW was developed at 94.6 km/h wheel speed and maximum torque developed 98.55 N m at 6.9 km/h speed.
As the wheel speed reached at maximum 150 rpm the torque decreased at 15.65 N m and when wheel speed was
minimum at that moment, maximum torque was achieved. The engine performance tests and emission tests were
conducted before and after coating In both performance tests the some important parameters like brake power,
torque and specific fuel consumption were recorded and it is tabulated below. The brake power, torque and specific
fuel consumption of petrol engine depends upon the air fuel mixture .Even though carburetor operated lean and rich
mixtures, there is a limit, if the air fuel mixture is maximum rich or minimum lean the flame propagation not sustain
and combustion does not occur. So while conducting the performance test the rich and lean mixture properly
maintained with help of adjusting the fuel jet screw in the carburetor. The maximum power developed was obtained
in the somewhat rich condition. At that time the maximum oxygen was consumed. The minimum fuel consumption
was attained at lean mixture condition at this time the flame speed was reduced which leads to decrease the
combustion efficiency and hence to increase the combustion flame speed and flame propagation rate for such
conditions the copper catalytic coating is used. When the engine is running at rich condition the hydrocarbon and
carbon monoxide emission increases in uncoated engines due to lack flame speed and slower rate of flame
propagation. With help of catalytic coating present in the coated piston and combustion chamber engine tends to
increase the combustion speed by means of catalytic activation. So the chance of complete combustion takes place
inside the combustion chamber. It is clearly indicating while comparing the emission results of coated and uncoated
engine, the coated engine emissions between the wheel speed 10-100 km/h, CO,HC ,O2 and CO2 level are
significantly reduced and NOx emission is slightly increased.

TABLE 3. Un-coated and coated engine test comparison results

Wheel Time Brake Brake Torque Torque CO CO HC HC NOX NOX

Speed power/ power/ Before After Before After Before After Before After
(km/hr) (S) Before After coating coating coating coating coating coating coating coating
coating coating in in in in (ppm) (ppm) (ppm)
in (kW) (kW) ( N-m) ( N-m) (%vol) (%vol) ( ppm )
IDLE 14.52 2.029 2.239 91.55 98.55 5.3 4.8 222 210 40 40

10 14.14 2.124 2.517 80.68 89.68 1.19 1.0 49 38 82 80

20 15.2 1.510 1.616 30.11 35.91 1.91 1.5 69 56 96 95

30 17.5 3.011 3.337 41.82 49.98 3.09 2.8 73 56 107 108

40 18.3 3.016 3.533 39.67 40.77 3.98 2.7 84 76 113 114

(Contd..)

020041-5
Wheel Time Brake Brake Torque Torque CO CO HC HC NOX NOX
Speed power/ power/ Before After Before After Before After Before After
(km/hr) (S) Before After coating coating coating coating coating coating coating coating
coating coating in in in in (ppm) (ppm) (ppm)
in (kW) (kW) ( N-m) ( N-m) (%vol) (%vol) ( ppm )
50 12.64 3.445 3.361 32.04 31.44 5.36 4.9 119 108 146 148

60 11.3 4.875 5.164 38.14 40.11 5.18 5.0 130 116 167 168

70 10.12 4.012 4.379 26.59 29.55 7.10 7.0 196 174 182 184

80 10.02 7.230 8.720 55.01 51.00 10.15 8.15 256 205 190 185

90 9.5 8.722 10.722 51.64 51.84 12.20 9.20 262 215 250 190

96 9.0 9.020 11.20 55.48 55.58 13.60 10.70 280 220 268 192

FIGURE 6. Un-coated engine test graph

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 FIGURE 7. Un-coated engine test graph

CONCLUSION
After conducting the experimental work the following conclusions are arrived. The effect of copper coating to
the combustion chamber walls and piston crown has clearly indicated that 15% lesser HC and CO emission
compared to conventional engine without coating at higher loads. And hence it is proved that copper coating is
very effective method for significantly to reduce the CO and HC emission. For SI engine copper coating is less
expensive. Therefore copper coating is most suitable technique for controlling emissions of SI engine.

REFERENCES
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the presence of a Metallic Wire Mesh, ASME TransactionsVol. 108, 1986
2. Nedunchezhian N &Dhandapani S, Heat Release Analysis of Lean Burn Catalytic Combustion in a Two-
Stroke Spark ignition Engine, Combustion Science and Technology, Vol. 155, pp. 181-201, 2000
3. M.V.S.Murali Krishna K.Kishor Journal of Scientific and Industrial Research,Vol.67, pp 543-548.2007
4. M.V.S Murali Krishna and.Journal of environ science and engineering vol 48,pp 97-10.2006
5. Narasimha Kumar, Murali K Krishna M.V.S. Murthy P.V.K., Reddy D.N., K. Kishor.
6. Performance of copper coated two stroke spark ignition engine with gasohol with catalytic
7. Converter with different catalyst” International journal of applied engineering research,Vol 2, No. 1, 2011.
8. P. Ponnusamy, R. Subramanian, N. Nedunchezhian, Experimental investigation on performance, emission and
combustion analysis of a four stroke SI engine with various catalytic coating, European journal of scientific
research, Vol. 63 No. 2, pp, 182-191,2011.

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