Cooper tests hydrogen mix on AJAX 2802 gas engine

Cooper tested a mixed fuel on a a standard two-stroke AJAX 2802 gas engine with 15” piston bore, 16” power stroke, and a speed range of 360-440 RPM.

Cooper Machinery Services has successfully tested a slow-speed integral engine running on a hydrogen (H2)-natural gas fuel blend. The test comes 5 months after the announcement of Cooper’s joint hydrogen research project with a major U.S. gas pipeline company to demonstrate the safe operating range of H2 blends in large-bore internal combustion engines.

“Cooper’s hydrogen development initiative took another large step forward today. We ran an unmodified large-bore, slow-speed integral engine-compressor with an H2 blend of 5% by volume, and we achieved significant reductions of methane in the exhaust,” said Cooper CEO John Sargent. “This is the first such run using significant amounts of hydrogen in an engine of this design.”

In May, the company plans to run up to 33% hydrogen by volume in the same stock engine. “Our customers have thousands of similar units running globally, so the potential reduction of methane is substantial,” he said.

The Cooper test was conducted at their slow-speed integral engine test cell at corporate headquarters located in Houston, Texas. The test engine is a standard two-stroke AJAX 2802 with 15” piston bore, 16” power stroke, and a speed range of 360-440 RPM.

Cooper selected the AJAX engine due to the similarities of its combustion system to that of the large fleet of the other engine brands the company services, which include Clark, Cooper-Bessemer, Ingersoll Rand, and Worthington.

Cooper Machinery Services, a portfolio company of Arcline Investment Management, is the original equipment manufacturer (O.E.M.) and supplier of parts and after-sale services, and emissions reduction technologies to a large installed base of highly respected engine-compressor brands. Its OEM brands include AJAX, Cooper-Bessemer, CSI, Enterprise, Gemini, Superior, TSI, and TXC.

The company is also a major supplier of after-sale support for non-Cooper engine-compressor brands such as Clark, CAT (G3600 engines), Ingersoll Rand, Waukesha (VHP engines), and Worthington. Manufacturing is conducted in its facilities in Houston, Texas; Deer Park, Texas; Salina, Kansas and McPherson, Kansas. On-site services are delivered through its network of field technicians operating out of fully equipped repair and overhaul shops strategically located around the world.