High viscosity causes poor atomization of the fuel in the combustion chamber and affects the peak injection pressure, the injection duration, the injection pressure-time history, the spray cone angle, and the quality of atomization. Transesterification may be either an acidolysis, where the acid component of an ester is replaced by another acid, or an alcoholysis, where the alcohol component of an ester is replaced with a different alcohol. Vegetable oils are esters of fatty acids and glycerol. In this work, the transesterification being studied is an alcoholysis where the glycerine component of a vegetable oil is replaced by an alcohol. Transesterification is a way to lower the viscosity of the vegetable oil by breaking up the triglyceride molecule and separating the fatty acid molecules from the glycerin molecule. In this paper, fuel related properties of the test fuels in consideration have been studied.

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Keywords: Atomization, Combustion Chamber, Spray Cone Angle, Transesterification, Acidolysis.