Research on Clogging Mechanism of Multilayered Fuel Filters and Extension of Filter Life Span in Ethanol Blended Fuel

摘要

Recently, the use of ethanol blended fuel is growing worldwide. Therefore, there is increasing needs for addressing issues relating to ethanol blended fuel use in gasoline engine fuel supply systems. In this paper, we focused on one of such issues, which is the reduced life of a multi-layered fuel filter used at inlet side of a fuel pump when it is used with ethanol blended fuel. In this study, we clarified that ethanol blended fuel tends to disperse dust particles contained in fuel to a greater extent than gasoline, and that it has a mechanism to accelerate clogging by concentrating the clogging only on the finest layer of the multi-layered filter. Also, in the process of clarifying this principle, we confirmed that dust particles dispersed by ethanol are coagulated when passing through the filter layers. Based on this, we developed a filter structure that increases dust particle capturing capability by combining dust particles into larger size before reaching the filter, thereby doubling the effective life of the filter for ethanol blended fuel.