Shell Eco-Marathon Fuel Consumption Engine Map
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Date
2022-07-24
Authors
Jaafar, Muhamad Fikri
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Abstract
The Shell Eco-Marathon Fuel Consumption Engine Map is a study to discover the
operating profile of an engine that was used as a drivetrain in the Shell Eco-Marathon
Challenge. As the participant, the USM team is required to build a fuel-efficient vehicle
prototype that can be driven further while consuming the least amount of fuel. A Honda
110 cc engine has been chosen to be used as the drivetrain for the prototype vehicle.
However, technical information regarding the engine operating profile is quite limited
causing difficulties in optimizing the prototype vehicle for the best fuel mileage. To
optimize the fuel consumption of the engine, the engine must be operated in its ‘sweet
spot’ of the fuel consumption map most of the time. The main objective of this project
is to discover fuel consumption, brake-specific fuel consumption, and brake thermal
efficiency for that particular engine. Knowing these parameters is important as it can
be used to find the engine map optimum point where the engine is capable to achieve
the highest thermal efficiency. This project involves engine modification, fabrication,
experiments, and programming. Before the experiment can be conducted, an automatic
centrifugal clutch delete modification is performed toward the engine to minimize the
mechanical losses during dynamometer engine testing. A few measuring instruments
were fabricated to make the data collection process easier. The dynamometer engine
testing is performed by utilizing an Eddy Current Dynamometer that is available at the
Automotive Laboratory, School of Mechanical Engineering, USM. During the
experiments, the performance and fuel consumption of the engine was observed at
different engine speeds and loads. The experiment’s result shows that the engine was
capable of producing a maximum torque of 7.31 Nm at 5500 RPM and maximum brake
power of 5.33 kW at 7500 RPM. The efficient operating zone of the engine occurred at
the lowest brake-specific fuel consumption was 347.3 g/kWh which was recorded at
5000 RPM with a 5.42 Nm load. The highest thermal efficiency achieved by the engine
is 23.87%. MATLAB programming software was used to construct a 3-D graph of fuel
consumption map, brake-specific fuel consumption, and brake thermal efficiency for
that particular engine. The finding of the engine operating profile is important as it can
be used to optimize the transmission drive ratio and driving strategy of the USM team
Shell Eco-Marathon prototype vehicle.