Development of an On-Road Heavy Duty Natural Gas Engine

Authors

Dr. Ir. R. Smaling, D. Mohr, D. Eckroth, A. Desai, Dr. C. Lana, Y. Yuan, K. Li, Cummins Inc., Columbus, IN, USA

Year

2016

Print Info

Fortschritt-Berichte VDI, Reihe 12, Nr. 799

Summary

Cummins Inc. (CMI) is a global leader in the design, development and sales of diesel and natural gas engines. Through our Cummins Westport (CWI) joint venture, we manufacture and market state of the art on-highway 9L and 12L engines in increasing numbers and are rounding out the lower end of the power range with the development of a 6.7 liter natural gas product. Current state of the art medium and heavy duty natural gas engines are diesel engine conversions spanning the range from 6.5L to 12L in displacement, primarily based upon stoichiometric combustion with cooled exhaust gas recirculation and 3-way catalysis. However, significant design compromises can result from merely converting a diesel engine to operate on natural gas. These compromises express themselves in terms of reduced reliability due to high thermal stresses, relatively low efficiency due to low volumetric efficiency and compression ratio, and poor performance in terms of power & torque density and transient response.