Heat transfer and chemical kinetics in the exhaust system of a cold-start engine fitted with a three-way catalytic converter

Abstract

Modelling of cold-start engine exhaust behaviour is a difficult task as it involves complicated heat transfer processes associated with water condensation and evaporation at the walls of the exhaust manifold/pipe and monolith cells, and the chemical reactions of CO/HC/NO in the three-way catalytic converter. This paper presents a model that is capable of predicting the exhaust gas temperatures along the exhaust system and across the catalyst monolith, both spatially and temporally, from the moment when the engine is cranked. The conversions of CO/HC/NO to harmless carbon dioxide, water and nitrogen at the catalytic converter downstream have been validated satisfactorily by the experimental data. The distortion of measured NO emission data/signals due to the dynamic behaviour of the chemiluminescence analyser has been reconstructed by means of a signal inference technique before these signals were used to validate the predictive capability of the model developed.