Experimental Study of Micro-Explosion Phenomena of Emulsified Fuel

Water in diesel emulsion contributes to a better alternative fuel to reduce pollutant due to the secondary atomization of the diesel fuel droplets during combustion which is known as micro-explosion. It is significant to know the variables that affect the stability of the emulsified fuel and also the parameters that influence the development of micro-explosion. This study is to experimentally determine the onset of micro-explosion on various water in diesel blends and to establish the parameters influencing the development of micro-explosion. Several emulsified fuel been prepared with different percentage of water and different dosage of surfactant used. These variables are used to collect data about the stability of each emulsified fuel produced and also to observe the progression and behavior of micro-explosion for every emulsified fuel. Each of the water in diesel blends have different stability where the level of stability is observed from the amount of sedimentation produced at the bottle of each emulsions. After a period of time, emulsion with surfactant‟s Hydrophilic-Lipophilic Balance (HLB) value closer to 5 shows more stability compared to emulsion with higher surfactant‟s HLB value. Furthermore, emulsion with higher dosage amount of surfactant and higher percentage of water has a thicker sedimentation formed at the bottom of each bottles. The experiments result shows that each emulsion has different progression and behavior of micro-explosion where the time taken for micro-explosion to occur and the temperature at which micro-explosion occur differ for every emulsion. Emulsion with a higher dosage of surfactant has a shorter time taken for micro-explosion to occur and a higher micro-explosion temperature compared to emulsion with a lower dosage of surfactant. Apart from that, more water in an emulsion would increase the time taken for micro-explosion to occur. The phase changes throughout the experiment are observed to study the progression and also the colour changes from the beginning of the experiment until micro-explosion occurs. Several emulsions show no micro-explosion while most of the emulsions have micro-explosion phenomena.