Performance Analysis of Vegetable Oil Blended With Diesel Additive

Biomass derived fuels are preferred as alternative Fuels for IC engine due to its abundant availability and renewable nature. In the present work, the performance and emissions of diesel and diesel additive blended with palm kernel oil is studied, where the fuel, namely, methyl ester of palm kernel oil and diesel with additive were chosen and used as fuel in the form of blends. Various proportions of palm kernel oil and diesel are prepared and blended with additive on a volume basis and used as fuels in a single cylinder, four-stroke DI diesel engine, to study the performance and emission characteristics of these fuels. In the present investigation a methyl ester derived from palm kernel oil used as a vegetable oil and additive used is considered as an ignition improver. The results show a 19% reduction in smoke with B25 and 23.8% reduction with B25+Additive, 13.3% reduction in HC emissions with B25 and 16% reduction with B25+Additive and a 14.16% reduction in CO emissions with B25 and 22.22% reduction with B25+additive for the 25% PKO blend and Additive with a 5.4% increase for B25 blend and 1% decrease when Additive added to blend in NOx emission at full load. There was a 2.18% increase in brake thermal efficiency for B25 blend and 2.73% increase with Additive to blend for MePKO25-diesel75 blend at full load.