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Diesel engines are frequently employed in industries, transport and agriculture. The rapid consumption of fossil fuel in the transportation sector compels a search for alternative sources of fuel for internal combustion engines. Lower volatility, unsaturated fats and higher viscosity of crude oil are major problems to use vegetable oil straight away as fuel. The present work aims to conduct the experiments with different proportions of Azadirachta indica oil with diesel. The biodiesel used for the experimentation is prepared by two-step transesterification process considering the optimized parameters such as reaction time and concentration of catalyst. With different trials, the reaction time (90 min) and the concentration of catalyst (1%) were finalized. Experiments were conducted on a variable compression ratio diesel engine to determine various performance parameters and its exhaust emissions for different blend proportions at various loads. The brake thermal efficiency of biodiesel blends is very similar to that of diesel up to partial loads. Higher brake-specific fuel consumption (BSFC) is noticed for biodiesel blends than mineral diesel. At maximum load, BSFC is the same for all percentage of blends along with mineral diesel. The exhaust emissions such as CO and UHC are lower for different blends, while NOx emission is more. By analyzing all the results with different blends of Azadirachta indica biodiesel, it is evident that it can be used as a promising alternative fuel for a diesel engine without further modifications in engine adjustments. Uncertainty analysis and repeatability tests were performed to check the accuracy of the results.

Energy is becoming a vital and crucial parameter in many technical, commercial and self-development sectors of an individualistic in any countries. In this context, fossil fuels are devaluing and t...

The present paper aims to review and forecast the chances of encouraging vegetable oils and their derivatives as alternative fuels in internal combustion (IC) engines with a turbocharger. The biodiesel-operated engines performance can be enhanced with the updated technology like turbochargers. The environmental concerned issues and alarming usage rate of fossil fuels demand the researchers and scientists to work vigorously on biodiesels as an alternate fuel for IC engines. The thermophysical properties of different biodiesels are nearly similar to that of conventional fuels. Most of the experimental work is carried out on the naturally aspirated diesel engine using diesel fuel and blended with biodiesels, but less work was accomplished with a turbocharger. The performance and emissions characteristics with different biodiesels in the diesel engine with turbocharger are analysed. Consumption of biodiesel in a diesel engine with turbocharger shows an extensive reduction in carbon monoxide, unburned hydrocarbon, particulate matters and nitrogen oxide emissions. Based on performance and emission characteristics, utilization of biodiesels in the turbocharged diesel engine provides better results when compared to conventional engines.

We report clinical profile of hundred and nine patients with SARS CoV-2 infection, and whole genome sequences (WGS) of seven virus isolates from the first reported cases in India, with various international travel histories. Comorbidities such as diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease were frequently associated with severity of the disease. WBC and neutrophil counts showed an increase, while lymphocyte counts decreased in patients with severe infection suggesting a possible neutrophil mediated organ damage, while immune activity may be diminished with decrease in lymphocytes leading to disease severity. Increase in SGOT, SGPT and blood urea suggests the functional deficiencies of liver, heart, and kidney in patients who succumbed to the disease when compared to the group of recovered patients. The WGS analysis showed that these isolates were classified into two clades: I/A3i, and A2a (four according to GISAID: O, L, GR, and GH). Further, WGS phylogeny and travel history together indicate possible transmission from Middle East and Europe. Three S protein variants: Wuhan reference, D614G, and Y28H were identified predicted to possess different binding affinities to host ACE2.

Purpose Investigations are carried out with the aim of improving performance of a diesel engine with the design modification on piston crown to stimulate the uniform combustion by inducing turbulence in the incoming charge. Design/methodology/approach A stirrer is introduced at the top of the piston so as to inculcate more turbulence to the incoming charge by improving the rate of fuel vaporization. Whirling motion is created in the combustible mixture by providing rotating blades on the cavity/bowl of the reciprocating piston head. By putting a simple link mechanism, the oscillatory motion of connecting rod will rotate the blade by an angle of 60°. Findings The investigations are carried out with and without swirl piston at 17.5 compression ratio and 200 bar injection pressure by varying injection timings. Originality/value Finally, the result shows that by using the modified piston, nearly 3 per cent of efficiency increased and 31 per cent of NOx emissions are reduced compared to that of a normal piston with 80 per cent load at standard injection timing.

Energy is becomes a vital and crucial parameter in many technical, commercial and self-development sectors of an individualistic in any countries. In this context, fossil fuels are devaluing and their costs are rises and hovering. While generating energy from the existing fossil fuels not alone economically infeasible but also provoke many sensitive environmental issues. Along with emissions from automobile sector, one of the other culprits in eco system is disposal of waste plastics. To meet the acute energy needs with eco-balance is utilizing plastic oil as functional fuel to run the engines. In the present work experimental investigations are carried out on multi cylinder petrol engine operating with 25 % plastic pyrolysis oil, with and without alcohol additives at 5 % volume basis is blended with petrol. It is noticed from the experimental results that, the engine performance with methanol additive is improved by 8.1 % than petrol and 21.74 % compared to without additive in plastic oil blend. Hydrocarbon emissions are substantially controlled by 54 % compared to petrol and 34.59 % than without additive in plastic oil blend at full load condition.

This study investigates the biodiesel from Deccan hemp oil and its blends for the purpose of fuelling diesel engine. The performance and emission characteristics of Deccan hemp biodiesel are estimated and compared with diesel fuel. The experimental investigations are carried out with different blends of Deccan hemp biodiesel. Results show that brake thermal efficiency is improved significantly by 4.15% with 50 BDH when compared with diesel fuel. The Deccan hemp biodiesel reduces NOx, HC and CO emission along with a marginal increase in CO2 and smoke emissions with an increase in the biodiesel proportion in the diesel fuel. The improvement in heat release rates shows an increase in the combustion rate with different percentage blends of Deccan hemp biodiesel. From the engine test results, it has been established that 30–50 BDH of Deccan hemp biodiesel can be substituted for diesel.

This paper aims to present the mechanical characterization of Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer Composites (GFRPC) under different load conditions. The dynamic mechanical properties of GFRPC are estimated experimentally. Different dies are designed for preparing and testing the GFRPC by multi directional loading. Samples are prepared at different compositions and reinforced with glass fiber at various mass fractions and plies by conventional hand lay-up process. The specimens are post cured for active bonding between reinforcement and matrix material, so that thermo-mechanical properties are enhanced to exercise for different applications. The glass fibers are added proportional to load bearing and optimized the reinforcement by weight percentage for particular grade applications. The prepared composites are characterized by Differential Scanning Calorimeter (DSC) to identify the glass transition temperature and nature of the interface between the phases, morphology of the prepared composites. Dynamic Mechanical Analysis (DMA) to determine the intrinsic properties as well as dynamic mechanical properties of GFRPC by three point flexural method. Slow Strain Rate Tensile Testing (SSRTT) exposes the stress, elongation and time at ultimate load and at the point of fracture. Here the test specimen is stretched monotonically in axial tension at a slow rate until failure. The SSRTTM testing is that it produces a result in a reasonably short time, within 6-12 hours in most cases, depending on strain rate to evaluation the effect of metallurgical variables such as alloy composition, heat treatment and processing and/or environmental parameters in a relatively short period testing.

The performance of engine parameters is more influenced with fuel injection strategies namely start of main injection timing (SoMI). An experimental analysis was performed to find the optimum SoMI timing based on performance, emission, and combustion characteristics. Base fuel of diesel and neem biodiesel was used as test fuels. The neem biodiesel was prepared by esterification and transesterification process. It is found from literature that neem biodiesel blend NB20 with diesel gives optimum performance and emission characteristics; therefore, NB20 blend was used for experiments. A variable geometry turbocharger (VGT) compression ignition (CI) engine was used to conduct the experiments. Engine performance parameters were estimated and compared with a base fuel of diesel and with NB20 blends. In this experimentation, fuel injection pressure (FIP) of 800 bar and engine speed of 1700 rpm were considered. SoMI timing was varied from 2° to 10° bTDC with an increment of 2° bTDC timing. Cylinder pressure (CP) and heat release rate (HRR) were estimated and found that are higher for diesel fuel compared to NB20 blend at different SoMI timings. The addition of neem biodiesel NB20 blend to diesel fuel decreases the exhaust emissions except NOx emissions. The BSFC was considerably reduced and BTE was improved almost equivalent to the diesel fuel for NB20. From the results, it is concluded that 10° bTDC SoMI timing provides 13% improvement in BTE, 21% decrement in BSFC, and 7.5% reduction in CO2 emissions.

The improvement of an automobile industry, growth in population and development of the world causes energy demand. At the same time, depletion of fossil fuels and increased environmental issues like the greenhouse effect and emissions from automated vehicles create a major demand for the search of alternative fuels. So, it is important to select an alternative fuel that can be obtained from vegetable oils, biodiesel, alcohol, etc., as renewable resources. Production of biodiesel from edible oil is a very good alternate, but in future food, shortage problems may occur. Due to this, non-edible vegetable oils are considered potential substitutes of edible food crops for biodiesel production. Azadirachta indica (neem), cottonseed, Calophyllum inophyllum (polanga), Jatropha curcas (jatropha), Linum usitatissimum (linseed), Madhuca indica (mahua), Nicotianna tabacum (tobacco) and Pongamia pinnata (karanja) are few non-edible oils. Thermophysical properties, production and characteristics of A. indica (neem), cottonseed and sesame oils are studied in detail in this paper. The real difficulty with an alternate fuel is that its higher viscosity value which increments concerning time, thus prompts cylinder staying, gum formation and fuel atomization issues. Mainly this problem is resolved with the help of transesterification process. So, initially, the basic properties are estimated and tabulated in this paper. From the three different fuels such as neem oil, cottonseed feedstock and sesame oil, properties are estimated, and it is found that the values are very close to base diesel fuel.

The objective of this research was to study the performance and emission characteristics of using waste automobile tyre pyrolysis oil (TPO) in a diesel engine without any engine modification. The engine used in this study is a single cylinder naturally aspirated four-stroke diesel engine (compression–ignition). In the present work, the performance and emission characteristics of the engine fuelled with blends of diesel fuel (DF) with automobile tyre oil in the ratio of diesel to waste automobile tyre oil of 90:10 (blend 10%), 80:20 (blend 20%), 70:30 (blend 30%), and 50:50 (blend 50%) are experimentally measured and analysed and compared with that of DF.

Existing fossil fuels are utilizing at their critical rate, leads to depletion of their reserves in a dramatic way. Generating alternative energy sources in a pragmatic way are necessitated, which demands the researchers to utilize the inherent energy of carbon based products as an energy source to the automobile sector. As a part of it, my research is focused on transforming and using the waste plastics as an alternative fuel in multi cylinder spark ignition engine. This paper aims to present the experimental investigations of performance and emission characteristics in an existing Maruti 800 petrol engine running with the blends of 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% of waste Plastic Pyrolysis Oil (PPO) with gasoline. From the results, it is noticed that hydrocarbon emissions are substantially reduced and oxides of nitrogen emissions are increased and petrol engine can operate with PPO blends up to 20% without any engine modifications.

In the present work, an experimental investigation is carried out to evaluate the use of plastic oil derived from waste plastic which used in a Spark Ignition engine. Experiments are conducted, the measured performance and emissions of plastic oil blends at different proportions are compared with the baseline operation of the SI engine running with gasoline fuel. Engine performance and exhaust gas emissions such as carbon monoxide, total unburned hydrocarbons, carbon dioxide and oxides of nitrogen are measured. From the experiments it is observed that 50% Distilled Plastic Pyrolysis Oil (50%DPPO) exhibits the substantial enhancement in brake power, brake thermal efficiency and reduction in brake specific fuel consumption running at full load conditions among different blends and pure petrol. There is also noticed decrement of carbon dioxide and unburned hydrocarbons emissions at the same blend. The experimental result shows that plastic oil shall conveniently be used as a substitute to gasoline in the existing SI engines without any modifications.

An investigation was made to determine the effects of ethanol at ultra-lean effective systems utilizing an experimental study. The present study is planned to develop and evaluate the performance, emission and combustion characteristics of the ultra-lean burn Internal Combustion engine was modified to operate on ethanol blends fuels. The study looked at part throttle, constant speed operation of 0%, 10%, and 15% ethanol blends with gasoline mixtures operating in ultra-lean operating systems. In experiment practice the use of homogeneous lean mixtures in engine has been handicapped by several difficulties. The most serious one is that the flame propagation through mixtures becomes gradually slower as the mixture becomes leaner. The mixture distribution in a multi-cylinder engine is a problem because even small variation in mixture ratio on the linear side will strongly effect power output. Enhancement of lean combustion of homogeneous mixtures can be achieved by (i) using ethanol blends with gasoline (ii) using high-ignition energy (iii) providing high compression ratios (iv) creating high swirl in the combustion chamber.

A review of research on low heat rejection engines, to incorporate various systems of ceramic materials in intermittent combustion engines, and on the use of ceramics in these engines is presented. The reduction of heat loss from the combustion chamber of diesel engines improves fuel efficiency only by 3 or 4 per cent. Some other gains may be possible from a smaller cooling system, recovery of exhaust energy, and improvements in aerodynamics. The use of thermal barrier coatings (TBCs) to increase the combustion temperature in diesel engines has been pursued for over 20 years. Increased combustion temperature can increase the efficiency of the engine, decrease the CO and (possibly) the NOx emission rate. However, TBCs have not yet met with wide success in diesel engine applications because of various problems associated with the thermomechanical properties of the coating materials. Although, the in-cylinder temperatures that can be achieved by the application of ceramic coatings can be as high as 850-9000C compared to current temperatures of 650-7000C. The increase in the in-cylinder temperatures helped in better release of energy in the case of biodiesel fuels thereby reducing emissions at, almost the same performance as the diesel fuel. The purpose of this paper is to explain the effect of insulation on engine performance, heat transfer characteristics, combustion and emission characteristics. Many researchers have carried out a large number of studieson Low Heat Rejection Engine (LHRE) concept. Some of them are experimental work and many are theoretical studies. In the case of LHR engines almost all theoretical studies predict improved performance but many experimental studies show different picture. This paper analyses the reason for this deviation. The operating conditions, under which the experimental and simulation studies are carried out, have been clearly discussed. The factors, which affect thermal efficiency, combustion, and exhaust emissions in LHR engine, are deduced and their influences discussed.

Usage of biofuels received much attention in the current situation of depleting fossil-fuel reserves and in- creased emission legislation. Many ideas have been implemented upon usage of biofuels for energy production to achieve low-emission levels. Internal combustion engines are the basic prime movers for power generation as well as for transpor- tation purpose, which are basically run on fossil petroleum. Usage of eco-friendly fuels like ethanol and biodiesel as alter- nate fuels in engines attracted the attention of researchers. The present work envisages the effects of ester addition to the ethanol-diesel blends like E10, E20 and E30. The performance and emissions nature of ethanol-diesel blended fuel was observed using a single-cylinder, direct injection, constant speed diesel engine. Exhaust gas recirculation was adopted to control NOx emissions. Engine performance in terms of brake specific fuel consumption, and brake thermal efficiency is compared. The results showed that, the engine performance has been improved with an addition of ester to ethanol-diesel blend. Considerable reductions in emissions also been observed with the addition of ester, and using the EGR option reduc- tion of NOx emissions was observed.

Biofuels like ethanol, biodiesel, have attracted attention of people worldwide and proved to be the successful fuel alternates to petroleum products. In the present investigation, the effect of supercharging is studied on the performance of a direct injection diesel engine using ethanol diesel blends with palm stearin methyl ester as additive. The performance of the engine is evaluated in terms of brake specific fuel consumption, thermal efficiency, exhaust gas temperature, un-burnt hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide emissions, and smoke opacity. The investigation results showed that the output and torque performance of the engine with supercharging was improved in comparison with naturally aspirated engine. It is observed that the brake thermal efficiency of ethanol diesel blends was higher than that of diesel. With supercharging brake thermal efficiency is further improved. Brake specific fuel consumption of ethanol, ester and diesel blends are lower compared with diesel at full load. Further reduction in brake specific fuel consumption is observed with supercharging. Nitrous oxide formation seems to decrease with ethanol, ester and diesel blends. Hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide emissions are more with ethanol, ester and diesel blends with supercharging slight reduction in those values are observed.