Proceedings of the
International Conference on Mechanical Engineering 2009
(ICME2009) 26- 28 December 2009, Dhaka, Bangladesh

ICME09-TH-27

WASTE VEGETABLE OIL AS AN ALTERNATIVE FUEL FOR
DIESEL ENGINE

Soma Chakraborty 1, Amit Adhikary 2 and M. Al Nur 3
1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, DUET, Gazipur-1700, Bangladesh,
2 Dhaka Power Distribution Company Limited and
3 Department of Mechanical Engineering, BUET, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh

ABSTRACT

Vegetable oils are emerging as promising fuel substitute to the conventional petroleum fuels from the view point of the energy crisis and emission problem. In this experiment waste vegetable oil is used as alternative fuel. Waste vegetable oil is used because it loose quality after being burnt several time. The waste vegetable oil’s volatility and heat content is found to be lower but density and viscosity to be higher. Viscosity is considered as the main obstacles of using them directly as CI engine fuel. In the present study waste vegetable oil is preheated and blended with 20% diesel fuel and their effects on engine performance is investigated on a direct injection, 4 stroke, single cylinder diesel engine. Engine performance has been evaluated with the help of both conventional performance parameters and availability analysis. It is observed that the engine exhibits better results for higher preheating temperature and performance parameters become comparable with that of diesel when the preheating temperature reaches 80oC. The performance parameters of the blend preheated to 100oC become very close to that of diesel fuel. Energy analysis shows similar result. Major portion of the fuel chemical availability is wasted in unaccounted factors and nearly 15% wasted with the exhaust gas which can be directly used for preheating.

Keywords: Waste vegetable oil, Engine performance, Energy analysis.

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