Laser-Based Spatio-Temporal Characterisation of Port Fuel Injection (PFI) Sprays

Abstract

In the present work, detailed laser-based diagnostic experiments were conducted to characterise the spray from low pressure 2-hole and 4-hole Port Fuel Injection (PFI) injectors. The main objective of the work included obtaining quantitative information of the spatio-temporal spray structure of such low-pressure gasoline sprays. A novel approach involving a combination of techniques such as Mie scattering, Granulometry, and Laser Sheet Dropsizing (LSD) was used to study the spray structure. The droplet sizes, distributions with time, Sauter Mean Diameters (SMD), droplet velocities, cone angles and spray tip penetrations of the sprays from the injectors were determined. The spray from these injectors is found to be ‘pencil like’ and not dispersed as in high pressure sprays. The application of the above mentioned techniques provides two-dimensional SMD contours of the entire spray at different instants of time, with reasonable accuracy.