Experimental and empirical analysis of a diesel engine fuelled with ternary blends of diesel, waste cooking sunflower oil biodiesel and diethyl ether

The present study was aimed to evaluate the performance, combustion, and emission characteristics of a single cylinder diesel engine fuelled with ternary blends of diesel, WCSO biodiesel and DEE. The preliminary results with diesel - WCSO biodiesel blends revealed that B20 is an optimum blend as its engine characteristics were closer to that of diesel. In order to increase the biofuel concentration in the blend without any compromise in the engine characteristics, B20 was blended with DEE at proportions of 5%, 10%, and 15% by volumetrically displacing the diesel concentration in the blend. For 10% addition of DEE in B20, the cetane index improved by 2.8% and the viscosity reduced by 29%. The improved fuel properties resulted in higher peak in-cylinder pressure, shorter ignition delay, and reduced combustion duration for DEE10. The BSFC reduced by 3.2% and BTE increased by 1.3% for DEE10 when compared to B20 at full load condition. Though the ternary blends significantly reduced CO, NOX and smoke emissions, an increase in HC emission was observed. In comparison with diesel, CO and smoke emissions decreased by 49.9% and 3.6%, respectively, for DEE10 at full load condition. The results showed that the optimum ternary blend, DEE10, can be used as a drop-in-fuel in an unmodified diesel engine. Further, an ANN model was developed, tested and validated with the engine characteristics of binary and ternary blends. The developed model precisely predicted the engine characteristics of different test fuels with a higher R-2 (0.98) value. The developed ANN model is further used to find the optimum DEE concentration for B40 and B60 blend.