Effect of di-n-butyl ether blending with soybean-biodiesel on spray characteristics

In this work, the schlieren method and particle/droplet image analysis technique were adopted to investigate the macroscopic and microscopic spray characteristics of di-n-butyl ether (DBE)/biodiesel blends, pure biodiesel and 0# diesel at different injection and ambient pressures. The results show that the addition of DBE to biodiesel can simultaneously reduce the density, viscosity and surface tension of biodiesel. As 30% DBE is blended with biodiesel, smaller SMD is observed compared with pure biodiesel, which indicates that DBE addition can promote the atomization of biodiesel.