Estimation of the oxide catalyst volume and the cells quantity influence on CO, HC and NOx conversion in the AVL boost computing application

The article contains the results of the simulation tests of oxidizing catalytic reactor obtained by use of the AVL Boost simulation application. The chemical reactions and the reactions rates on which computations were based are specified in this paper. The simulations were related to the influence of the catalytic reactor volume and reactor’s cells quantity influence on the carbon oxide, hydrocarbons and nitric oxides conversion levels. The influence on the nitric oxides conversion was presented in this paper as the content of NO and NO2 in NOX. The simulated computations were performed separately for the variable reactor volume ranging from 1 to 2.2 dm3 with a step of 0.4 dm3 and for the variable reactor cells quantity ranging from 200 to 600 cells per square inch with a step of 100 cpsi. As the input data for the simulation computations the actual values of the toxic compounds concentrations in the exhaust gases at the outlet of the Diesel engine were used. The measurements of the toxic compounnds were made at the chosen engine steady state work points and are presented in this paper as a graph of the toxic gases concentrations in the form of the function of the engine torque. The simulation computaitons were performed for the same points and their results are also presented in the form of the function of the engine torque. The Results presented in this paper have shown that the increase in the CO, HC and NOX conversion in the case of the oxide catalyst can be obtained both by increasing the reactor volume and its cells quantity. It also have been observed that the increase in the reactor cells quantity and volume is not proportional as regards the toxic gases conversion increase and lowers in the case of higher values of the simulated reactor parameters.