Development of thermophysical and transport properties for the CFD simulations of in-cylinder biodiesel spray combustion

This paper reports the development, validation, and application of the thermophysical and transport properties of coconut, palm, and soy methyl esters for fuel spray and combustion modeling under light-duty diesel engine conditions. The developed fuel library is implemented in an open-source CFD code. The fuel properties are validated for both constant volume combustion chamber and compression ignition (CI) engine operation at a wide range of conditions. Sensitivity analysis on the effects of individual fuel properties is also investigated under both conditions. The properties of interest for the study are density, vapor pressure, heat of vaporization, liquid heat capacity, vapor heat capacity, second-virial coefficient, liquid dynamic viscosity, vapor dynamic viscosity, liquid thermal conductivity, vapor thermal conductivity, surface tension, and vapor diffusivity. From these twelve physical and transport properties, only five have significant effects on fuel spray structure, combustion, and emission characteristics. These are vapor pressure, vapor diffusivity, surface tension, liquid density, and liquid dynamic viscosity. However, only vapor pressure and surface tension have the strongest influence on the mixture preparation process.