Nigerian Journal of Technological Development (Jun 2010)
POWER PERFOMANCE UNDER CONSTANT SPEED TEST WITH PALM OIL BIODIESEL AND ITS BLENDS WITH DIESEL
Abstract
The torque and power performance tests were carried out with a single cylinder techno four-stroke diesel engine under constant speeds of 2000, 1500 and 1100 rpm. Five fuels, the Dura Palm Oil biodiesel/diesel blend at 10/90 vol/vol, B210 and the diesel or Automotive gas oil (ago), the reference fuel, were involved. Brake torque and brake power data were plotted against brake mean effective pressure (Bmep) since the latter is independent of engine speed and size and it is an indication of how power and torque are obtained per litre of fuel. The curves for the torque versus Bmep for the five fuels merged into single straight line curve which extended to the origin and with a gradient of 0.0719 m3 for all the three speed tests of 2000, 1500 and 1100 rpm. Similarly, the power versus Bmep curves for the five fuels merged into one straight curve which also extended to the origin but with different gradients of 0.0151, 0.0113, 0.0083 for 2000, 1500 and 1100 rpm respectively. Therefore, the five fuels had similar torque and power performance characteristics in the engine. The straight line curve which can be extrapolated to any value can be used for the engine designs, that is determining vd from the relation, T=V/4 or Bp=VdN/2
