Original Article

Modelling of the exhaust gas

recirculation rate based on the
in-cylinder pressure measurement for
a passenger car diesel engine

Proc IMechE Part D:

J Automobile Engineering
115
IMechE 2015
Reprints and permissions:
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DOI: 10.1177/0954407015586700
pid.sagepub.com

Jihyun Ryu, Jaesung Chung and Myoungho Sunwoo

Abstract
This paper proposes a modelling of the exhaust gas recirculation rate using the in-cylinder pressure sensor for a passenger car diesel engine. Traditional modelling approaches for the exhaust gas recirculation rate normally use variables
which are measured for a long intakeexhaust air path so that a time delay is inevitable. In addition, the model structure
is complex, since many non-linear or unmeasurable variables such as the volumetric efficiency and the efficiency of the
exhaust gas recirculation cooler have to be considered in the model. The proposed exhaust gas recirculation rate model
is based on the in-cylinder pressure measurement which provides instantaneous information about combustion.
Therefore, when this information is used, it is able to model the exhaust gas recirculation rate with a fast response compared with traditional modelling approaches. Furthermore, the proposed model can have a simple model structure since
the model does not require consideration of the non-linear or unmeasurable parameters of the air path. The proposed
exhaust gas recirculation rate model was integrated into an engine control unit and validated through engine experiments on various operating conditions.

Keywords
Exhaust gas recirculation, in-cylinder pressure, modelling, control, diesel engine

Date received: 15 November 2014; accepted: 8 April 2015

Introduction
Emission and energy restrictions have been strengthened as interest in the environment has increased. In
order to meet these strengthened emission and energy
regulations, many technologies such as common-rail
direct injection, variable-geometry turbochargers
(VGTs) and exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) have been
developed.
Among those technologies, the EGR system is a representative technology for reducing the nitrogen oxide
(NOx) emissions.14 The EGR system involves recirculating a portion of the exhaust gas from an exhaust
manifold into the cylinders. When the amount of EGR
gas increases in the cylinder, the combustion temperature decreases owing to the reduced available oxygen
concentration and the raised heat capacity. As a result,
the NOx emissions (which are sensitive to the combustion temperature) decrease.58 Nevertheless, other emissions such as carbon monoxide (CO) and particulate
matter increase.911 In addition, the reduced thermal

efficiency degrades the engine performance parameters

such as the fuel efficiency and the output torque.10,12
Therefore, it is important to control the amount of
EGR gas to optimize these trade-off correlations.
Conventional engine control systems use the rate of
mass (fresh-)air flow (MAF) as a reference variable to
control the fresh air and the EGR gas. However, the
mass flow rate of the EGR gas can change even though
the MAF rate is constant because of the MAF sensor
located upstream of the compressor. Therefore, it is not
easy to control the fresh air and the EGR gas with only
the MAF sensor. Nevertheless, the EGR rate can

Department of Automotive Engineering, Hanyang University, Seoul,

Republic of Korea
Corresponding author:
Myoungho Sunwoo, Department of Automotive Engineering, Hanyang
University, 222 Wangsimni-ro, Seongdong-gu, Seoul 133-791, Republic of
Korea.
Email: msunwoo@hanyang.ac.kr

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Proc IMechE Part D: J Automobile Engineering

Figure 1. Overview of the experimental apparatus.

NI: Natonal Instruments; EC: eddy current; ECU: engine control unit; CyPAS: cylinder pressure analysis system.

represent directly the amount of EGR gas in the mixture of fresh air and EGR gas, and so it is a more
appropriate variable to control the mixture of fresh air
and EGR gas precisely.
It is difficult to measure the EGR gas with a sensor
because the conditions of the EGR path are too harsh
to install a sensor. Since the temperature and the pressure of the exhaust gas are high, and since particulate
matter also causes problems such as sensor fouling,
using a sensor is not suitable for the EGR system
because of the sensors durability.10,13 Consequently, a
model is required to estimate the EGR rate.
Traditional EGR rate modelling approaches use
values that are measured along the long intakeexhaust
air path,14 and so a time delay is inevitable. In addition,
the modelling is difficult and the model structure
is complex, since many non-linear or unmeasurable
variables such as the valves effective area or the efficiency of each component are considered for the
model.1519
Based on the in-cylinder pressure measurement, it is
possible to obtain the physical values for the EGR rate
model directly with a fast response. Furthermore, the
EGR rate model can be simplified even more, since it
does not consider the non-linear elements such as the
efficiency or the valves effective area of each component. Desantes et al.20 introduced MAF rate estimation
for the EGR rate using the in-cylinder pressure sensor.
They proposed a regression model for estimating the
cylinder air charge. However, although this model is
simple and its computational time is short, it cannot
guarantee accuracy of the model outside its modelling
range since the model is based on an empirical model
and not a physical model.

In this study we propose an EGR rate model based

on the in-cylinder pressure measurement. The proposed
model is based on the physical model to improve the
model accuracy, and this model has a fast response
since it uses the in-cylinder pressure measurements as
an input. The proposed model was integrated into the
engine control unit (ECU) and validated through several engine cell tests. Furthermore, EGR rate control
tests were also carried out to validate the feasibility of
the proposed model.

Experimental environment
Experimental apparatus
The environment for the engine experiments is
described in Figure 1. The target engine is a 2.2 l inline
four-cylinder common-rail diesel engine for a passenger
car with high-pressure EGR, low-pressure EGR and
VGT systems, as shown in Figure 2. Table 1 lists the
detailed engine specifications. The engine is connected
to an eddy-current dynamometer which controls the
engine speed and the load. The maximum errors in
some key parameters of the engine experiments are
listed in Table 2.
Four glow plug-type in-cylinder pressure sensors
were installed in each cylinder. These sensors were produced by Continental. AVL INDICOM and the cylinder pressure analysis system (CyPAS) are used to
acquire the in-cylinder pressure data. The in-cylinder
pressure at every 0.1 C is obtained using INDICOM.
Based on this measurement, it is used for offline analysis to determine the crank angle (CA) interval, which is
one of the parameters for EGR rate modelling. The

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Figure 2. Schematic diagram of the air system of a diesel engine equipped with high-pressure EGR, low-pressure EGR and a VGT.
HP-EGR: high-pressure exhaust gas recirculation; LP-EGR: low-pressure exhaust gas recirculation VGT: variable-geometry turbocharger.

Table 1. Specifications of the target diesel engine.

Table 2. Maximum errors of the key parameters.

Parameter

Value

Parameter

Maximum error

Engine type
Number of cylinders
Injector type
Cooling type
Bore
Stroke
Displacement volume
Compression ratio
Firing order
Intake valve open timing
Intake valve closed timing
Exhaust valve open timing
Exhaust valve closed timing

Inline, double overhead camshaft

4
Piezoelectric
Water cooled
85 mm
96 mm
2199 cm3
16.0:1
1342
10 CA BTDC
28 CA ABDC
54 CA BBDC
4 CA ATDC

Engine speed
Engine load (brake mean effective pressure)
Coolant temperature

2 r/min
0.3 bar
0.1 C

CA: crank angle; BTDC: before top dead centre; ABDC: after bottom
dead centre; BBDC: before bottom dead centre; ATDC: after top dead
centre.

CyPAS calculates parameters such as the polytropic

coefficient and the heat release for online estimation of
the EGR rate. This process is described in more detail
in the section on the CyPAS.
Additional sensors such as thermocouples and pressure sensors are used to monitor the engine states via
cRIO, and the intercooler is equipped with an electric
valve to control the temperature of the intake manifold.
The EGR rate and other emissions such as NOx and
CO are measured with a HORIBA MEXA-1600D

exhaust gas analyser. As shown in Figure 3, all measurements are transmitted to VN1630 by controller
area network (CAN) communication so that they are
monitored and logged through a personal computer.
An in-house ECU was used for engine control with an
in-house software platform (AUTOSAR-Ready).21,22
An MPC5554 was used as the microcontroller for the
ECU. The EGR rate model was implemented in the
ECU by the autocode generation method using
MATLAB/Simulink.

Cylinder pressure analysis system

Figure 4 represents the structure of the CyPAS. The
CyPAS measures in-cylinder pressure information
according to the CA position. After the measured incylinder pressure is filtered and pegged, the parameters
used for the EGR rate model are calculated and transmitted to the ECU through CAN communication.
The constants used in this paper are given in Table 3.
The in-cylinder pressure is filtered with a hardware
low-pass filter with a cut-off frequency of 3 kHz and

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Proc IMechE Part D: J Automobile Engineering

Figure 3. Structure of the DAQ system.

sig.: signal: CAN: controller area network; Elec.: electrical; Comm.: communication; CyPAS: cylinder pressure analysis system; ECU: engine control
unit; PC: personal computer.

Figure 4. Structure of CyPAS.

and therefore

Table 3. Values of the constants used in this paper.

Symbol

Description

Units

Value

k
R
Va
Vb
Vint

polytropic coefficient
Universal gas constant
In-cylinder volume at a
In-cylinder volume at b
Intake manifold volume

kJ/kg K
m3
m3
m3

1.4
0.287
0.0004
0.000 12
0.002

filtered again with a SavitzkyGolay23 filter to remove

noise. The measured pressure signal has an offset
because of the thermal shock of the piezo element;
therefore, it is removed using the two-point referencing
method.24
After the filtering and pegging process, the CyPAS
calculates the parameters for the EGR rate model such
as the differential in-cylinder pressure between two specific CA positions, the polytropic coefficient and the
heat release. If the compression process is assumed to
be adiabatic, then the polytropic coefficient k is derived
from
Pa Vka = Pb Vkb

k=

logPa =Pb
logVb =Va

The polytropic coefficient is assumed to be known

and constant; to ensure this, it was checked and found
to be reasonably constant for all operating conditions.
The rate of heat release is calculated from the incylinder pressure25 according to
dPcyl
dQ
g
dV
1
=
Pcyl
+
V
du
g1
du
g1
du

The heat release can be obtained by integrating the rate

of heat release to obtain the in-cylinder temperature.

EGR rate model

The proposed EGR rate model is shown in Figure 5. In
order to obtain the EGR rate, the total mass of mixed
gas is determined on the basis of the in-cylinder pressure measurement. The specific heat and the intake
manifold temperature are used to determine the total
mass of mixed gas. However, these parameters cannot

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Figure 5. Block diagram of the EGR rate estimation algorithm.

EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

be measured directly, and so they are obtained with

empirical models using some measurable parameters
such as the intake manifold pressure, the engine speed,
the injected fuel mass and the MAF rate.

Definition of the EGR rate

The mixed gas in the cylinder is composed of fresh air
and EGR gas. By the law of mass conservation, the
total mass of mixed gas is expressed as the sum of the
mass of fresh air and the mass of EGR gas according
to
3

mtot = mair + mEGR

The equation that defines the EGR rate, which is the

proportion of the amount of exhaust gas to the total
amount of mixed gas taken into the engine, is given by


mair
FEGR = 1 
3100
4
mtot
The mass of fresh air is calculated using the engine
speed and the MAF rate, which is measured with the
MAF sensor. However, measuring the total mass of
mixed gas directly is difficult owing to the harsh environment of the EGR path, and so a model is required.

Determination of total mass of mixed gas

When the intake valve and the exhaust valve are closed,
the cylinder is regarded as a closed system, which means
that there is no mass change. On the assumption that
the in-cylinder temperature at a specific CA is known,
the total mass mtot of mixed gas is expressed using the
ideal-gas equation

Figure 6. Piston movement during the compression stroke.

Pu Vu = mtot RTu

and therefore
mtot =

Pu Vu
RTu

However, piezoelectric-type in-cylinder pressure sensors have a sensor voltage drift due to thermal shock,
so that there is offset in the measurement signal.
Although the pressure signal has an offset, the pressure
difference between the two CA positions is constant.
Therefore, the total mass of mixed gas could be determined using the DP method based on this pressure
difference.19
DP method. As shown in Figure 6, the in-cylinder pressure increases when the piston moves from a to b

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Proc IMechE Part D: J Automobile Engineering

during a compression stroke. If this process is assumed

to be adiabatic, then from
Pa Vka = Pb Vkb

the in-cylinder pressure at b is expressed as

 k
Va
Pb =
Pa
Vb

Since the cylinder temperature at IVC is assumed to

equal the temperature of the intake manifold in an ideal
intake process,20 the heat generated during that period
can be expressed as
Q = cmtot Ta  Tint

By combining equations (12) and (13), the cylinder

temperature at a is expressed as

Also
DP = Pb  Pa

If the mixed gas is assumed to be an ideal gas, then

from
Pa Va = mtot RTa

the in-cylinder pressure at a is represented as

Pa =

mtot RTa
Va

By substituting the in-cylinder pressure at a from

equation (8) into
  k 
Va
DP = Pa
1
9
Vb
the difference in the in-cylinder pressures is
expressed as
 

mtot RTa Va k
DP =
1
10
Va
Vb
Finally, by rearranging equation (10), the total mass
of mixed gas is expressed as
 
1
DP Va Va k
mtot =
1
11
RTa
Vb
Cylinder temperature at a. In equation (11), the total mass
of mixed gas is obtained from the pressure difference,
the cylinder temperature at a and other constants such
as the ideal-gas constant, the cylinder volume and the
polytropic coefficient. The in-cylinder pressure difference is measured with the in-cylinder pressure sensor,
and other constant values are known. Nevertheless, it is
difficult to measure the cylinder temperature directly,
and so the cylinder temperature at a should be
estimated.
In this study, the cylinder temperature at a was
determined on the basis of heat release analysis during
the compression stroke. After integrating the rate of
heat release (which is represented in equation (2)) from
the CA with the intake valve closed (IVC) to the CA at
a, the heat release between IVC and a is calculated
from
a
Q=
IVC

dQ
du
du

12

13

Ta =

Q
+ Tint
cmtot

14

By substituting the cylinder temperature at a from

equation (14) into equation (11) and rearranging, the
total mass of mixed gas is expressed as
(
)
 
1
1 DP Va Va k
Q
mtot =
1 
15
Tint
c
R
Vb
As shown in equation (15), the intake manifold temperature needs to be known in order to calculate the
total mass of mixed gas. However, mass-produced passenger cars are generally not equipped with a sensor for
measuring the intake manifold temperature. Therefore,
on the basis of the ideal-gas equation,26 the intake
manifold temperature is modelled as
Pint Vint
T^int =
^ int R
m

16

Additionally, in order to validate this model, an

intake manifold temperature sensor was added for the
purpose of correlation. The intake manifold pressure
can be measured with a boost pressure sensor, and the
mass of gas in the intake manifold is estimated using
the empirical model, which is expressed as


^ int = f Pint , WNair
m
17
= a1 + a2 Pint + a3 WNair
In equation (15), the intake manifold temperature,
the cylinder pressure difference and the heat release can
be measured, and we already know other constant
parameters such as the gas constant, the polytropic
coefficient and the cylinder volume at each position.
However, the specific heat is unknown because it is difficult to measure or calculate. Therefore, by considering some parameters that affect the process (the engine
speed, the injected fuel mass, the MAF rate, the intake
manifold pressure and the temperature), an empirical
model is suggested in this study according to
c = c1 c2 c3 c4 c5 c6 c7 c8 c9 c10 
h
i
3 Pint Tint mf m2f N N2 Wair W2air N2 W2air 1
18

In particular, the engine speed, the fuel injection

quantity and the MAF rate are dominant factors of the
specific heat, and so quadratic factors for them are

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7
included. The calibrated values of constants are as
shown in Table 4.

Table 4. Values of the constants for the specific heat model.

Constant

Value

C1
C2
C3
C4
C5
C6
C7
C8
C9
C10

9.00
4.29 3 1022
7.31 3 102
3.99 3 1023
1.79 3 1022
5.22 3 1026
4.28 3 1022
7.22 3 1024
9.83 3 10211
3.15 3 1021

Figure 7. Operating conditions of the engine for modelling

parameter identification.
str: stroke; rpm: r/min.

Modelling results
In order to determine the CA interval for the DP
method and to identify the modelling parameters,
engine cell tests were conducted in a total of 60 test
cases. At each given case of 20 operating conditions as
shown in Figure 7, the MAF set point was changed
from the nominal point to the nominal point 6 50 mg/
stroke. At this time, the load was changed from 2 bar
to 8 bar. Even though the operating conditions of the
engine were constant, the NOx emissions can change
because of external environmental factors such as the
coolant temperature and the ambient pressure; therefore, the MAF set point was changed to consider the
effects of one of the external environmental factors of
the MAF rate.
The CA positions of a and b for the DP method were
determined with the in-cylinder pressure measurement
data at every 0.1 CA from INDICOM to minimize the
cycle-by-cycle variation and the polytropic coefficient
variation. These results are shown in Table 5 and
Table 6 respectively, and so the interval was selected as
100 CA ATDC at a and 40 ATDC at b to minimize
the variations.
The modelling results for the intake manifold temperature are shown in Figure 8 with an r.m.s. error
(RMSE) of 3.03 K and R2 = 0.9091. Figure 9 shows
the modelling results for the specific heat, which is

Table 5. Mean absolute errors due to cycle-by-cycle variation for different intervals.
Crank angle at a

IVC
140
120
100
80
60

Mean absolute error (%) due to cycle-by-cycle variation for the following crank angles at b
140

120

100

80

60

40

44.553
66.809

18.379
22.262
31.046

8.340
9.512
10.116
14.560

3.810
4.144
4.051
4.511
6.439

1.620
1.731
1.626
1.685
1.856
2.519

IVC: intake valve closed.

Table 6. Mean absolute errors due to polytropic coefficient variation for different intervals.
Crank angle at a

IVC
140
120
100
80
60

Mean absolute error (%) due to polytropic coefficient variation for the following crank angles at b
140

120

100

80

60

40

74.016

16.952
22.525

7.825
6.649
8.801

4.545
3.751
3.924
3.033

3.764
2.936
2.465
1.344
1.706

3.152
2.452
1.955
1.058
1.008
0.769

IVC: intake valve closed.

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Figure 8. Modelling results for the intake manifold temperature.

Figure 9. Modelling results for the specific heat.

represented in equation (18) with an RMSE of

0.2751 kJ/kg K.
With the previous modelling results for the intake
manifold temperature and the specific heat, the EGR
rate was modelled using the experimental data. Figures
10 and 11 show the modelling results. As shown in
Figure 11, the EGR rate from the proposed model
shows a similar tendency to that of the measured EGR
rate with an RMSE of 0.8199% and R2 = 0.9763 even
when the operating conditions were changed.

Experimental validation
The EGR rate model was integrated into an ECU. In
order to validate the proposed EGR rate model, several
engine experimental tests were carried out.

Steady-state experimental results

The operating conditions of steady-state validation
experiments differ from those of the modelling

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Figure 10. Modelling results for the EGR rate.

EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

Figure 12. Operating conditions for the validation tests in the

steady state.
Figure 11. Evaluation of the linearity between the measured
EGR rates and the modelled EGR rates.

rpm: r/min.

EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

experiments. The engine speed and the brake mean

effective pressure (BMEP) were changed as shown in
Figure 12.
Figures 13 to 15 show the validation experiment
results for steady-state tests. Figure 13 shows the validation results for the EGR rate. As shown in Figure 13,
the modelled EGR rate shows a similar tendency to that
of the measured EGR rate with R2 = 0.9611 and an
RMSE of 0.6015%. The maximum difference between
the measured value and the modelled value is 1.35%.
Figure 14 and Figure 15 show the steady-state validation results for the intake manifold temperature and the

specific heat respectively. The maximum percentage

errors are 2.19% for the intake manifold temperature
and 7.18% for the specific heat; the RMSEs are 3.60 K
and 0.13 kJ/kg K respectively.

Transient experimental results

The proposed EGR rate model was also validated in
transient operating conditions. Figures 16 and 17 show
the transient experimental results for the EGR rate.
The first transient test was carried out at a fixed engine
speed of 1500 r/min with a step change in the BMEP as
follows: 4 bar ! 6 bar ! 8 bar ! 6 bar ! 4 bar. Each
BMEP was retained for 60 s. The other operating

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Proc IMechE Part D: J Automobile Engineering

Figure 13. Steady-state validation results for the EGR rate.

rpm: r/min; BMEP: brake mean effective pressure; EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

Figure 14. Steady-state validation results for the intake manifold temperature.

conditions were not changed during the test. As shown

in Figure 16, the errors between the measured EGR
rate and the estimated EGR rate for the transient state
were within 4%.
Additionally, the model performance in the transient
state was evaluated during the changes in the MAF set
point. In the previous validation tests, the operating
conditions were determined by the engine speed and
the BMEP. However, even though the operating

conditions were kept constant, the MAF rate changed

in practice. When the MAF set point increases, the
MAF rate also increases so that the mass of EGR gas
is reduced. Consequently, the EGR rate decreases. The
set point of the MAF was step changed as follows:
(nominal point 50) mg/stroke ! nominal point mg/
stroke ! (nominal point + 50) mg/stroke ! nominal
point mg/stroke ! (nominal point 50) mg/stroke.
Each set point of the MAF was retained for 40 s with a

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Figure 15. Steady-state validation results for the specific heat.

Figure 16. Transient validation results for the EGR rate with a step change in the BMEP at an engine speed of 1500 r/min.
BMEP: brake mean effective pressure; EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

fixed engine speed and a fixed BMEP. Figure 17 shows

the transient estimation results of the EGR rate. The
error of the EGR rate was within 5% across the whole
test period.

desired EGR rate according to the operating conditions

of the engine such as the engine speed and the injection
quantity. Each generated value from the look-up table
(LUT) was based on experimental data from the
steady-state tests for modelling.

Case study: EGR rate control

The feasibilities of the proposed EGR rate model for
EGR rate control were also validated with a simple
feedforward and proportionalintegral (PI) feedback
controller.

Structure of the controller

Figure 18 shows the structure of EGR rate control.
The feedforward controller generates a desired EGR
valve position based on the engine speed and the injection quantity. The set-point generator generates the

Experimental results
EGR rate control was conducted with several engine
tests.
First, the EGR rate was controlled following the
desired EGR rate which was changed at fixed operating
conditions. This test was performed to check whether
the EGR rate could be controlled at the fixed point of
operation without any problem. Figure 19 shows the
results for EGR rate control when the EGR rate set
point was changed as follows: 15% ! 20% ! 15%. In
this test, each EGR rate set point was retained for 60 s,

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Proc IMechE Part D: J Automobile Engineering

Figure 17. Transient validation results for the EGR rate with a step change in the MAF set point at an engine speed of 2000 r/min
and a BMEP of 4 bar.
MAF: mass air flow; EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.

Figure 18. Structure of the EGR rate controller.

EGR: exhaust gas recirculation; PI: proportionalintegral; HP-EGR: high-pressure exhaust gas recirculation.

and the operating conditions were fixed at an engine

speed of 1500 r/min and a BMEP of 4 bar. As shown in
Figure 19, the EGR rate from the proposed model
showed a rise time of 0.6 s while the measured EGR
rate took 3 s to respond to the set-point change; this
resulted from the relatively long sampling line of the
gas analyser.
Subsequently, another EGR rate control test was
carried out with changing operating conditions. The

EGR rate tracked the set point which is generated on

the basis of an LUT according to the operating conditions. Figure 20 shows the transient control results with
a fixed BMEP of 4 bar when the engine speed was changed as follows: 1250 r/min ! 1500 r/min ! 1250 r/min.
The desired EGR rate was changed as follows: 20% !
15% ! 20%. The maximum rise time of the EGR rate
from the proposed model was 1.4 s, and that of the
measured EGR rate was 5.5 s.

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Figure 19. Transient control results for the EGR rate with a step change in the set point at an engine speed of 1500 r/min and
BMEP of 4 bar.
EGR: exhaust gas recirculation; HP-EGR: high-pressure exhaust gas recirculation.

Figure 20. Transient control results for the EGR rate with a step change in the engine speed at a BMEP of 4 bar.
BMEP: brake mean effective pressure; EGR: exhaust gas recirculation.
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Summary

Declaration of conflict of interest

In this section, we confirmed the feasibility of EGR

rate control using the proposed EGR rate model with a
simple feedforward and PI feedback controller as a case
study. Through the engine experiments under both
fixed operating conditions and changed operating conditions, we validated that the EGR rate from the proposed model can be used as a feedback variable for
controlling the amount of EGR gas.

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Conclusions
In this paper, the EGR rate model based on the incylinder pressure measurement was proposed for a
passenger car diesel engine. The conclusions are
summarized as follows.
1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

The total mass of mixed gas was determined on

the basis of the DP method. The intake manifold
temperature and the specific heat for calculation of
the total mass of mixed gas were determined from
models. In addition, the cylinder temperature was
calculated from the heat released during the compression stroke.
The steady-state data for modelling were obtained
by changing the engine speed, the fuel injection
quantity and the MAF rate. With these data, modelling was conducted so that the parameters of each
model were identified. As a result, the EGR rate
modelling results showed high linear correlation
compared with the measured EGR rates with an
RMSE of 0.8199% and R2 = 0.9763.
The proposed EGR rate model was implemented
on a real-time embedded system and validated with
several engine experiments. The steady-state test
results were similar to the measured EGR rates
with an RMSE of only 0.6015% and R2 = 0.9611.
Transient-state tests were also conducted and
showed that the error was within 5% throughout
the whole test period.
Additionally, EGR rate control tests were conducted as a case study to validate the feasibility of
this model. Through these tests, we verified that
the proposed EGR rate model is appropriate for
the feedback control variable.
However, the proposed model did not consider the
effect of internal EGR. Therefore, in order to
improve the accuracy of the model, the internal
EGR should be considered when modelling the
EGR rate. Furthermore, the EGR rate model uses
the in-cylinder pressure sensor. Thus, in order to
apply this model, installation of an in-cylinder
pressure sensor is inevitable. However, this problem will be solved since several mass-produced incylinder pressure sensors are now available for
applications, and some automotive manufacturers
have already implemented an in-cylinder pressure
sensor in their vehicles.27,28

Funding
This research was financially supported by the BK21
plus program (grant number 22A20130000045) under
the Ministry of Education in the Republic of Korea
together with the National Research Foundation of
Korea grant funded by the Korean Ministry of
Education, Science and Technology (grant number
2011-0017495). In addition, the research was financially
supported by the Industrial Strategic Technology
Development Programs (grant numbers 10039673 and
10042633) of the Ministry of Knowledge Economy.
Finally, this work was supported through the Energy
Resource Research and Development Program (grant
number 2006ETR11P091C) under the Ministry of
Knowledge Economy in the Republic of Korea.
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Appendix 1
Notation
c
F
m
N
P
Q
T
u
V
W
g
e
u

specific heat (kJ/kg K)

fraction (%)
mass (kg)
speed of the engine (r/min)
pressure (kPa)
net heat release (kJ)
temperature (K)
valve position (%)
volume (m3)
mass flow rate (mg/stroke)
ratio of the specific heats ()
percentage error (%)
crank angle (deg)

Superscripts
^


estimated value
mean value

Subscripts
a
air
b
cyl
EGR
f
int
tot

predefined crank angle at position a

fresh air
predefined crank angle at position b
cylinder
exhaust gas recirculation
fuel
intake manifold
total

Abbreviations
BMEP
CA
CAN
CO
CyPAS
ECU
EGR
IVC
LUT
MAF
NOx
PI
RMSE
VGT

brake mean effective pressure

crank angle
controller area network
carbon monoxide
cylinder pressure analysis system
engine control unit
exhaust gas recirculation
intake valve closed
look-up table
mass (fresh-)air flow
nitrogen oxides
proportionalintegral
root mean square error
variable-geometry turbocharger

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