Performance Analysis of Kusum Methyl Ester as Alternative Bio-fuel in Diesel Engine with Diethyl Ether as Additive

The fossil fuels are widely used in diesel engine and continually depleting with increasing consumption and prices day by day. The fatty acid methyl ester has become an effective alternative to diesel. Various types of vegetable oil such as Jatropha, karanja, cottonseed, neem, sunflower, palm, mahuva, coconut etc. can be used as fuel in diesel engine. Kusum oil is one of the fuel used in the present work. The viscosity of kusum oil is very high,   so it was reduced by Transesterification process.

This study presents effect of diethyl ether as additive to biodiesel of kusum (schliechera oleosa) methyl ester on the performance and emission  of diesel engine at different load and constant speed and two different injection pressure (170 and 190 bar). From literature, it was observed that very few studies had been conducted on the use of neat biodiesel and diethyl ether blends and use of Kusum methyl ester (KME) in diesel engine found to be very less as compared to different biodiesel. Hence this topic was taken under study.  The fuels and its blends used are 100% diesel, B100 (100% KME), BD-1 (95% KME, 5% DEE), BD-2 (90% KME, 10% DEE), BD-3 (85% KME, 15% DEE) respectively. It was observed that the performance of the engine increases at high injection pressure. The results indicate that lower BSFC was observed with BD-3 as compared to B100, BD-1 and BD-2. Brake thermal efficiency of BD-3 decreased at 170 bar injection pressure, but it increases at 190 bars. Drastic reduction in smoke is observed with all blends at higher engine loads. DEE addition to biodiesel reflects better engine performance compared to neat biodiesel.