In-situ unburned gas temperature measurement in a spark ignition engine using laser interferometry

A heterodyne interferometry system with a fiber-optic sensor was developed to measure the temperature history of unburned gas in a spark-ignition engine. A polarization-preserving fiber and metal mirror were used as the fiber-optic sensor to deliver the test beam to and from the measurement region. This fiber-optic sensor can be assembled in an engine cylinder head without a lot of improvements of an actual engine. Adjustment system in the sensor was revised to face the distributed index lens with metal mirror. Before the flame arrived at the developed fiber-optic sensor, measured temperature was almost same with the temperature history after the spark, assuming that the process that changes the unburned gas is adiabatic. In situ unburned gas temperature measurements before knocking in a commercially produced SI engine can be carried out using developed fiber-optic heterodyne interferometry system. Although the heterodyne interferometry with the developed fiber-optic sensor provides the mean temperature along the line of sight, the feasibility of our system was sufficient to be applied to temperature history measurement of an unburned gas compressed by flame propagation in an engine cylinder. The developed heterodyne interferometry with fiber-optic sensor has a good feasibility to measure the unburned gas temperature history in the commercially produced spark-ignition engine.