Page 9 - Methods For Monitoring And Diagnosing The Efficiency Of Catalytic Converters A Patent - oriented Survey

viii Methods for Monitoring and Diagnosing the Efficiency of Catalytic Converters

subject index is found at the end of the book. A list of the non-patent literature used is also
cited at the end of the book.

It is not unusual that the patent applications have been filed in several countries, each referring
to a common first filing i.e. priority. These applications are said to belong to the same patent-
family. In this book the earliest published document of a patent family has been selected to be
cited. The reader may choose to consult a family document published in another language from
the patent numbers index found at the end of the book.

The basic principles of modern catalytic converters are described in an extensive Introduction,
where the importance of monitoring and diagnosing the efficiency of catalytic converters is
proven.

The book is divided into four parts.
The first part describes methods involving the use of oxygen or aidfuel ratio exhaust gas
sensors to determine the oxygen storage capacity of a catalytic converter.
The second part describes methods involving the use of temperature sensors to determine the
exothermic reaction capacity of a catalytic converter.
The third part describes all other methods existing in patent literature that monitor and
diagnose the efficiency of catalytic converters. The great majority of the methods of the third
part comprises exhaust gas concentration measurements.
The fourth part comprises a general discussion of all methods described.

I would like to thank the editor, Simon Behmo, for his help and interest in this book, the
directors Jean-Marie Schmitter and Hermann Nehrdich for their support, the director Roland
Wohlrapp and my colleagues Simon Mansell, Alan Fordham, Peter Raven and Panos
Triantaphillou for critically reading the manuscript and for their many helpful suggestions.

For permission to use certain figures and tables, thanks are extended to the Society of
Automotive Engineers (SAE), to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, to Springer-Verlag
Wien-New York, to Elsevier Science B.V. and to the publishers of Automotive Engineer and
Automobiltechnische Zeitschrifi (ATZ).

I must not end without an expression of immense gratitude to my wife Virginia and to my sons
Theodore and Dimitrios for their understanding and support which they have given me during
the writing of this book.

Rijswijk, February 1998

Marios Th. Sideris