Measurement and Monitoring of Pressure Curves in Diesel Engines

A method for cylinder pressure curve analysis is presented which may be used for real time control and diagnosis of Diesel engines. By subtracting the pressure samples of a firing motor from the non firing case, a difference pressure curve can be obtained which contains hidden information on internal motor conditions. To use this information, a real time data reduction has been implemented which generates symptoms like the centre of gravity or the maximum pressure from the data samples and may be processed by a classification algorithm (i. g. an artificial neural network). With the presented method it becomes possible to separate heat transfer problems from combustion or injection failures and to adjust motor characteristics properly. The validity of our approach is supported by simulation and experimental data.