Honda Giken Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha

Takahiro Tachihara

Naoyuki Abe

Kiyoshi Kasahara

Kouji Miyano

Masahito Nakamura

Yuuji Asano

Satoshi Hanai

Yasunori Kotani

Hikaru Okada

Hideaki Sumi

Takeshi Yamagami

Kouji Ueda

Kazuhito Matsuda

Shiyuuichi Togasawa

Shoji Isove

Eiji Iseki

A method of warming up a fuel evaporator is disclosed. The fuel evaporatorcomprises: an evaporation chamberequipped with a first injection devicefor injecting raw fuel liquid onto a heat sourceand vaporizing the raw fuel liquid on the heat source; a catalyst combustorhaving a combustion catalystand introducing catalytically burned combustion gas into the heat source; a second injection devicefor supplying fuel to the catalyst combustor; a combustion gas transferring deviceequipped with a fuel injection portionand a combustion catalystand the fuel injection portion injecting fuel onto the combustion catalyst to generate a catalytically burned gas; a first temperature measurement device Tfor the catalyst combustor; and a second temperature measurement device Tfor the evaporation chamber. The warm-up method comprises the steps of: transferring the combustion gas with the combustion gas transferring device; stopping the combustion gas transferring device in accordance with a temperature of the catalyst combustor, and transferring fuel to the catalyst combustor with the second injection device; and injecting the raw fuel liquid from the first injection device in accordance with a temperature of the evaporation chamber so as to vaporize the raw fuel liquid within the evaporation chamber.

Method of warming up a fuel evaporator

A fuel evaporator composed of an evaporation chamber which evaporates a raw liquid fuel by a high temperature thermal medium to provide a raw fuel gas is disclosed. The evaporation chamber comprises a plurality of evaporation chambers serially connected to each other in a ventilation manner, and at least one raw liquid fuel injector for injecting the raw liquid fuel being provided on each of said plurality of evaporation chambers.

Fuel evaporator

A raw fuel vaporizing apparatus comprising: a vaporizer for vaporizing liquid raw fuel; a raw fuel introducing device for introducing the liquid raw fuel into the vaporizer; a catalyst combustor into which fuel and air are supplied for catalytic combustion, the catalyst combustor generating heat in the presence of a catalyst and supplying the resulting heat to the vaporizer to vaporize the liquid raw fuel; a fuel introducing device for introducing the fuel into the catalyst combustor; an air introducing device for introducing the amount of the air suitable for catalytic combustion into the catalyst combustor; a heat transferring gas introducing device introducing heat transferring gas into the catalyst combustor to transfer heat retained by the catalyst combustor to the vaporizer; and a controller increasing the amount of the heat transferring gas through the heat transferring gas introducing device when the amount of vapor generated in the vaporizer is increased.

Raw fuel vaporizing apparatus, method of vaporizing raw fuel, and fuel cell system equipped with raw fuel vaporizing apparatus

A fuel evaporator is provided in a fuel cell system FCS having an evaporating chamber that evaporates liquid fuel into fuel gas by heat medium gas. The fuel evaporator is provided with a liquid fuel injection apparatus that injects liquid fuel into the evaporating chamber and an injection volume adjusting apparatus that adjusts the injection volume of the liquid fuel injection apparatus. The injection volume adjusting apparatus includes an injection volume adjusting portion that sets the fuel injection volume according to an injection volume target setting signal.

Evaporator liquid fuel injection apparatus and fuel cell system

In a fuel evaporator provided with an evaporation chamber that produces raw fuel gas FG by vaporizing raw fuel liquid by heat received from a plurality of heat medium tubes through which a high temperature heat medium passes, a raw fuel injection portion that injects raw fuel liquid onto the heat medium tubes is situated in the evaporation chamber . The heat medium tubes are arranged sparsely near the raw fuel injection portion and densely away from it. A catalytic combustor is provided adjacent to the bottom surface of the evaporation chamber to form the high temperature heat medium. Such a fuel evaporator efficiently vaporizes raw fuel liquid and can be suitably applied in a fuel cell system for a fuel cell-powered automobile.

A fuel evaporator raw fuel injection apparatus A includes an evaporator having an evaporating chamber in which raw fuel liquid FL is evaporated by a high temperature heating chamber (heating gas) into raw fuel gas, and which is provided with a first injection portion (fuel injection portion A) that injects the raw fuel liquid FL into the evaporating chamber , and a second injection portion (air injection portion A) that injects gas or liquid (air A) with a prescribed directional property into the raw fuel liquid FL injected from the fist injection portion (fuel injection portion A), adequately atomizes and disperses raw fuel liquid and achieves highly efficient evaporation of raw fuel liquid.

Evaporator raw fuel injection apparatus

A warm-up apparatus for a fuel evaporator comprises: a catalyst combustor for catalytically burning exhaust gas from a fuel cell to produce combustion gas and supplying the fuel evaporator which evaporates raw fuel liquid with the produced combustion gas as an evaporation heat source; an exhaust gas passage for transferring exhaust gas to the catalyst combustor; and a combustion gas transferring device including a fuel injection portion and a combustion catalyst , and injecting fuel from the fuel injection portion onto the combustion catalyst, where the fuel is catalytically burned to produce combustion gas, and thereafter transferring the produced combustion gas to the catalyst combustor. The combustion gas transferring device is positioned on one side of said exhaust gas passage.

Warm-up apparatus for fuel evaporator

A reformer comprises first and second reforming catalyst layers arranged in a reforming chamber, and a supply mechanism for supplying reformable fuel gas, steam, and oxygen to the reforming chamber to simultaneously perform an oxidation reaction and a reforming reaction in the first and second reforming catalyst layers. Each of the first and second reforming catalyst layers is designed to have a hollow plate-shaped configuration with its surface direction perpendicular to a gas flow direction in the reforming chamber. Accordingly, a compact fuel-reforming apparatus having a good thermal efficiency is obtained, in which the start-up operation is smoothly effected.

Growing community of inventors

Saitama, Japan

Takahiro Tachihara