Conference Participation: SETC2025: 29th Small Powertrains and Energy Systems Technology Conference/Florence, Italy
Dr. Yizhuo Feng represented our team at SETC2025: The 29th Small Powertrains and Energy Systems Technology Conference, held in Florence, Italy, from 10–13 November 2025 (Conference/Paper Link).
At this international event, Dr. Feng delivered a presentation titled:
“Computational Investigation on a Boosted Uniflow Scavenged Direct-Injection Combustion Engine (BUSDICE) with Alcohol Fuels.”
The research explored the combustion and spray-mixing behaviour of the BUSDICE concept when fuelled with methanol and ethanol, comparing their performance to conventional gasoline (iso-octane) under high-load conditions. Alcohol fuels—derived from renewable sources—offer promising pathways toward low-carbon internal combustion engines.
Key findings from the study include:
Longer injection durations for methanol and ethanol result in partial evaporation but also induce stronger turbulence, improving local fuel–air mixing.
All fuels demonstrate an “outer-rich, central-lean” mixture stratification pattern due to limited mixing time.
Methanol shows a shorter ignition delay and faster flame propagation thanks to a richer mixture near the spark plug.
Alcohol fuels tolerate more advanced spark timing without knock, enabling higher indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) and improved indicated thermal efficiency (ITE) compared with iso-octane.
Unburnt hydrocarbon emissions are significantly reduced, especially for methanol, where they approach near-zero levels.
NOx emissions increase slightly due to higher combustion temperatures, while ethanol shows a small soot increase related to mixture stratification.