Development and Testing of a Laboratory Scale Induction System for a Bottled Producer Gas Fuelled IC Engines

In this paper an attempt has been reported to bring out the development and testing features of a laboratory scale induction system suited to bottled (fixed composition) PG powered IC engine. A four stroke, single cylinder, spark ignited engine was tested with a bottled PG at a Compression Ratio (CR) of 11:1 and engine speed of 1500 rpm from no-load to full load engine operation. Using suitable throttling devices, a 130 bar supply gas cylinder pressure was conditioned along with other devices to operate engine at Naturally Aspirated (NA) mode. The engine was operated close to stoichiometry condition. The engine supported a peak load of 85 % amounting to a torque of 11.89 N-m and brake power of 1.86 kW against a 2.2 kW gasoline mode. A power loss of 15 % was observed and it was attributed to 25 % lower mixture heating value and 13.33 % lower product to reactant conversion ratio of PG. Overall engine operation was found to be satisfactory. This paper also addresses the need for customizing PG-air mixer and zero pressure regulator.