EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF SPRAYS’ CHARACTERISTICS USING GASOLINE-ETHANOL BLENDS AS FUEL FOR AERONAUTICAL ENGINES

Abstract

This work presents a proposal of experimental investigation of sprays’ characteristics for combustion of aeronautical engines using gasoline-ethanol blends as fuel, in order to reduce general aviation operational costs and damages to the environment. In order to reach this aim it is necessary to study combustion process, mainly the atomization of sprays. The injection process is critical in combustion process because it needs to have high energetic efficiency and control particulate material emissions. Controlling correctly responsible parameters for performance is an effective way to obtain high energetic efficiency and a clean combustion. Here are showed three different methods to analyze the characteristics of sprays and how these characteristics can affect the combustion process. These methods are: Planar Laser Induced Fluoresce, Spread of Drop and Particle Image Velocimetry. In the final step ecological efficiency concept is applied to evaluate the environmental impact caused by CO₂, SO₂, NO_x and particulate material (PM) emissions. The resultant pollution of each one of fuels are analyzed, considering separately the CO₂, SO₂, NO_x and particulate material (PM) emissions. Finally, the conventional gasoline, considering a same thermal efficiency of 30%, presents an ecological efficiency of 0,824 and the alcohol presents an ecological efficiency of 0,895.