Experimental study on the flow field of particles deposited on a gasoline particulate filter

The abatement of particulate matter in gasoline vehicle exhaust has prompted the development of gasoline particulate filters (GPFs). The spatial distribution of the deposited particles inside a GPF has profound implications for its regeneration behavior, ash-induced aging, and multiscale modeling efforts. The connection cones will affect the flow into the monolith and the package structure needed to meet the system space requirements. In this paper, nonuniform rational B-splines (NURBSs) were applied to the cone design to optimize the flow uniformity and particle distribution inside a gasoline particulate filter. NURBS and conventional cones were manufactured using 3D printing, and the velocity profiles and pressure drops were measured under the loading of synthetic particles. The results shows that the cone shape will influence the pressure drop and the velocity profile, which is evaluated as the uniformity index. The test results indicate that better performance is achieved when using the NURBS cone, especially at low particle loads. The results also show that the cone shape (which determines the velocity profile) influences the particle deposition distribution, although the apparent pressure drops are similar. These results are important for exhaust aftertreatment system (EATS) design and optimization, where the NURBS cone can improve flow uniformity, which causes better particle deposition distribution and lower pressure drop.