Experimental and model-based analysis of combustion and auto-ignition of gasoline and three surrogate fuels in a single-cylinder research engine operated under knocking conditions

A systematic analysis of knocking combustion at the knock limit in a single-cylinder research engine is conducted. Both experimental and numerical methods are used to investigate the physical phenomena involved in knocking combustion. While real gasoline fuel can be used directly in experimental studies, this is not feasible in numerical simulations. Here, surrogate fuels with a reduced number of components defined to match the desired properties, such as knock resistance, are employed. In this work, standard gasoline and three surrogate fuels are considered. Differences in composition complexity are covered by selecting isooctane and two toluene reference fuels (TRF) with ethanol addition, all of which exhibit negative temperature coefficient (NTC) behavior in which auto-ignition delay times increase with increasing temperature. Spark timing sweeps at two engine speeds show that the knock resistance of the fuels correlates with the respective research octane number (RON). Isooctane is found to have higher knock resistance and higher sensitivity to engine speed than standard gasoline. One of the two TRFs studied shows good agreement with gasoline in terms of combustion and knock characteristics. The lower knock resistance of the other TRF indicates a non-linear dependence between mixture composition and knock resistance. A strong relative increase in knock resistance at higher engine speeds suggests a possible influence of NTC behavior at lower engine speeds. In the subsequent model-based analysis, the fuel influence on combustion and auto-ignition is investigated, and the laminar burning velocities are found to correlate well with the observed heat durations. While auto-ignition may be triggered by a cool spot at the lower engine speed and at operating conditions within the NTC regime, auto-ignition at the higher engine speed is assumed to be initiated by hot spots. These different mechanisms for initiating auto-ignition were identified as a potential explanation for the different knock resistances observed.