Optimal stationary control of diesel engines using periodic control

Measurements and optimal control are used to study whether the fuel economy of a diesel engine can be improved through periodic control of the wastegate, illustrating how modern optimal control tools can be used to identify nontrivial solutions that can improve performance. The measurements show that the pumping torque of the engine is changed when the wastegate is controlled in a periodic manner versus stationary even if the mean position is the same. If this decreases the fuel consumption or not is seen to be frequency and operating point dependent. The measurements indicate that the phenomenon occurs in the time scales capturable by mean value engine models (MVEM). The operating points are further analyzed using a MVEM and optimal control. It is shown that whether the optimal solution exhibits periodic oscillations or not is operating point dependent, but is not due to the instantaneous nature of the controls. Even if an actuator model is added the oscillations persist for reasonable time constants, the frequency of the oscillations is however affected. Further it is shown that the periodic control can be predicted by optimal periodic control theory and that the frequency of the control affects the resulting efficiency.