Effects of Ethanol Blends on Performance of Spark Ignition Engine-A Review

Bio-fuels have grabbed attention of engine researchers ever since the oil crisis and increasing cost of crude oil in the 70's. Ethanol has been the most widely researched alcoholic fuel in IC engine. The present paper discusses the effect of ethanol-gasoline blends as a bio-fuel in the conventional spark-ignition engine. The paper reviews and brings into light the properties of ethanol, production procedure and the effect of various ethanol blends on the performance of engine. The parameters focused for this study are the engine brake torque, engine volumetric efficiency and thermal efficiency with the effect on the exhaust emissions, which is one of the present prime concerns. The merits as well as the disadvantages of using ethanol as a fuel in Spark Ignition Engines also discussed. It has been seen that with the increasing proportion of ethanol in the blend, the overall thermal efficiency, heat release rate, engine volumetric efficiency and cylinder gas pressure increases. The requirement of compression ratio for occurrence of ignition also rises with the proportion of ethanol in the blend. (c) 2017 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Selection and/or Peer-review under responsibility of 7th International Conference of Materials Processing and Characterization.