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In the present experimental investigation, performance, emission and combustion characteristics of a single cylinder diesel engine using diesel-biodiesel blends and antioxidant containing biodiesel test fuels was carried out. The potential suitability of aromatic amine based antioxidants to enhance the oxidation stability of biodiesel on one hand and reduction of tail pipe oxides of nitrogen (NOx) on the other were evaluated. Tertiary Butyl Hydroquinone (TBHQ) was considered as the antioxidant and Calophyllum Inophyllum vegetable oil was taken as the feedstock for biodiesel production. The test fuel samples were neat diesel (D100), 10% and 20% blend of Calophyllum biodiesel with diesel (CB10 and CB20) and 1500 ppm of TBHQ in CB10 and CB20 (CBT10 and CBT20). The results indicated that neat biodiesel blended test fuels (CB10 and CB20) exhibited lower brake thermal efficiency compared to the diesel baseline by a margin of 3% to 10% at full load.

Use of diluting agents in neat vegetable oil to reduce its density and viscosity, is arguably the best alternative route for vegetable oil usage in diesel engines. It is suitable where the complex transesterification process for biodiesel production is not feasible. In this study, Calophyllum vegetable oil was diluted with 10%, 20% and 30% by volume of Isopropyl alcohol and named as CI10, CI20 and CI30 respectively. Neat diesel was termed as D100. An exhaustive field trial on a single cylinder agricultural diesel engine indicated that full load brake thermal efficiency of D100 was 26.4% followed by CI10, CI20 and CI30 test fuels. Emissions of carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons and smoke were impressively reduced by a margin of 17-63% for the isopropyl alcohol containing test fuels as compared to the diesel baseline. However, oxides of nitrogen emissions were marginally higher for the isopropyl alcohol blends.