Cummins Inc.

Michael Robert Tidwell

Mert Geveci

Mark N Bays

Richard E Reisinger

Andrew W Osburn

Rodney J Hemmerlein

Anand Manthena

An apparatus includes an input module structured to interpret a fuel pressure command indicative of a target fuel pressure within an accumulator and a target fuel injection characteristic, a pump module structured to control a pump assembly to provide fuel to the accumulator to maintain the target fuel pressure within the accumulator, an injector module structured to control a plurality of fuel injectors to inject fuel into an engine based on the target fuel injection characteristic, a pressure module structured to interpret pressure data regarding an actual fuel pressure within the accumulator and to determine a pressure difference between the target fuel pressure and the actual fuel pressure, and a modulation module structured to determine a final fuel injection command responsive to the pressure difference exceeding a first magnitude threshold where the final fuel injection command is based on the pressure difference and the target fuel injection characteristic.

Fuel pressure control for engine fuel systems

A method for testing a fuel injector including providing an engine with a common rail fuel injection system having one or more fuel injectors; operating the engine at a selected set of operating conditions; conducting a motoring event; allowing a first settling duration; measuring a first rail pressure; operating a first selected injector including operating the first selected injector singly in response to a selected fuel quantity, a selected number of combustion cycles, and a selected number of injections per combustion cycle; allowing a second settling duration; measuring a second rail pressure; calculating a pressure difference value in response to the first rail pressure and the second rail pressure; inferring an amount of fuel delivered by the first selected injector in response to the pressure difference value; and evaluating a first performance factor of the first selected injector in response to the amount of fuel delivered.

Service bay high pressure common rail injector performance test

A fuel system has a fuel rail containing pressured fuel coupled to a plurality of fuel injectors. The system is operable in one embodiment to adjust fuel injector on-times by selecting one of the fuel injectors, determining a critical on-time for the selected injector corresponding to a minimum on-time duration to which the selected fuel injector is responsive to inject a discernable amount of fuel, generating an on-time for the selected fuel injector, determining an adjusted on-time for the selected fuel injector based on the generated on-time for the selected fuel injector, the critical on-time for the selected fuel injector and a reference critical on-time, and activating the selected fuel injector for the adjusted on-time to inject fuel into the engine. Alternatively or additionally, the adjusted on-time may be based on one or more estimated fuel injection quantities injected by the selected fuel injector.

System and method for adjusting fuel injector on-times

A fuel system has a source of fuel coupled to a plurality of fuel injectors via a fuel rail. The system is operable to estimate a quantity of fuel injected into an internal combustion engine by disabling fuel flow from the source of fuel to the fuel rail, and monitoring a fuel request corresponding to a request for delivery of fuel by the fuel system to the engine produced by the engine. If the fuel request is below a threshold fueling level a selected fuel injector is controlled to inject a selected quantity of fuel from the fuel rail into the engine while inhibiting fuel injection the remaining fuel injectors, fuel rail pressure is sampled, a drop in the fuel rail pressure, resulting from injection of the selected quantity of fuel, is determined from the fuel rail pressure samples, and the quantity of fuel injected by the selected injector is determined as a function of the drop in fuel rail pressure.

System for monitoring injected fuel quantities

A fuel system has a source of fuel coupled to a plurality of fuel injectors via a fuel rail. The system is operable to determining a critical on-time for a selected one of the injectors by disabling fuel flow from the source of fuel to the fuel rail, periodically sampling fuel rail pressure, activating the selected injector for an on-time duration while inhibiting injection by remaining ones of the injectors, determining from the fuel rail pressure samples a pressure drop resulting from activation of the selected injector for the on-time duration, processing the pressure drop to determine whether or not the selected injector injected fuel, and repeatedly modifying the on-time duration followed by executing the sampling, activating, determining and processing steps until a critical on-time is determined that corresponds to a minimum on-time duration to which the selected fuel injector is responsive to inject a discernable amount of fuel.

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Bloomington, IN, United States of America

Michael Robert Tidwell