scholarly journals Heat-Transfer Characteristics of a Cryogenic Loop Heat Pipe for Space Applications

Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1616
Author(s):  
Jaehwan Lee ◽  
Dongmin Kim ◽  
Jeongmin Mun ◽  
Seokho Kim

Infrared detectors on satellites and spacecraft require cooling to increase their measurement sensitivity. To efficiently cool infrared detectors in a zero gravity environment and in limited spaces, a cryogenic loop heat pipe (CLHP) can be used to transfer heat over a certain distance by the capillary forces generated from porous wicks without a mechanical power source. The CLHP presented in this study transfers the heat load to a condenser 0.5 m away from an evaporator at temperatures below −150 °C. The CLHP with two evaporators includes a subloop for initial start-up, and uses a pressure reduction reservoir (PRR) for the supercritical start-up from room to cryogenic temperature. Nitrogen is used as the working fluid to verify the thermal behavior of the CLHP, and the heat-transfer capacity according to the nitrogen charging pressure of the PRR is investigated. To simulate a cryogenic environment, the CLHP is installed inside a space environment simulator, including a single-stage GM (Gifford McMahon) cryocooler to cool the condenser. The CLHP is horizontally installed to simulate zero gravity. The heat-transfer characteristics are experimentally evaluated through the loop circulation of the CLHP.

2009 ◽  
Vol 131 (8) ◽  
Author(s):  
Randeep Singh ◽  
Aliakbar Akbarzadeh ◽  
Masataka Mochizuki

Two phase heat transfer devices based on the miniature version of loop heat pipe (LHP) can provide very promising cooling solutions for the compact electronic devices due to their high heat flux management capability and long distance heat transfer with minimal temperature losses. This paper discusses the effect of the wick properties on the heat transfer characteristics of the miniature LHP. The miniature model of the LHP with disk-shaped evaporator, 10 mm thick and 30 mm disk diameter, was designed using copper containment vessel and water as the working fluid, which is the most acceptable combination in electronic cooling applications. In the investigation, wick structures with different physical properties including thermal conductivity, pore radius, porosity, and permeability and with different structural topology including monoporous or biporous evaporating face were used. It was experimentally observed that copper wicks are able to provide superior thermal performance than nickel wicks, particularly for low to moderate heat loads due to their low heat conducting resistance. With monoporous copper wick, maximum evaporator heat transfer coefficient (hev) of 26,270 W/m2 K and evaporator thermal resistance (Rev) of 0.06–0.10°C/W were achieved. For monoporous nickel wick, the corresponding values were 20,700 W/m2 K for hev and 0.08–0.21°C/W for Rev. Capillary structure with smaller pore size, high porosity, and high permeability showed better heat transfer characteristics due to sufficient capillary pumping capability, low heat leaks from evaporator to compensation chamber and larger surface area to volume ratio for heat exchange. In addition to this, biporous copper wick structure showed much higher heat transfer coefficient of 83,787 W/m2 K than monoporous copper wick due to improved evaporative heat transfer at wick wall interface and separated liquid and vapor flow pores. The present work was able to classify the importance of the wick properties in the improvement of the thermal characteristics for miniature loop heat pipes.


Author(s):  
Z. R. Lin ◽  
Z. Y. Lee ◽  
L. W. Zhang ◽  
S. F. Wang ◽  
A. A. Merrikh ◽  
...  

Loop heat pipe (LHP) is a highly efficient cooling device. It has gained great attention in the electronics cooling industry due to its superior heat transport capability — that is, its ability to carry heat over long distances. For this article, a miniature flat loop heat pipe (MFLHP) with rectangular-shaped evaporator was developed. The LHP’s evaporator was combined with the compensation chamber. MFLHPs with different diameters and lengths for the connecting pipeline were selected for a series of experimental studies on their heat transfer characteristics. In these experiments, pure water was used as the working fluid. The studies showed that the heat transport capability of a MFLHP with 4 mm diameter was better than that a MFLHP with 3 mm diameter. At a low thermal resistance of 0.04°C /W (at 200W), an optimal length for the connecting pipeline for a particular MFLHP with 4 mm diameter was identified. Finally, a heat sink attached to a MFLHP was developed for cooling a graphics processing unit (GPU), the thermal design power (TDP) of which was 200 W. The results showed the GPU heat sink with MFLHP had good performance and satisfied GPU cooling requirements. Compared to the conventional heat pipe solutions, only one MFLHP was able to cope with high power dissipation, offering the potential to make a lighter heat sink.


Author(s):  
Haizhen Xian ◽  
Dengying Liu ◽  
Yongping Yang ◽  
Xiaoze Du

In this paper, experimental investigations on the heat transfer characteristics of OHP with ethanol as working fluid were conducted. The experimental results show that there exists a necessary temperature difference between evaporator and condenser section to keep the heat pipe working. The minimum temperature differences for the optimal operating conditions varied from 1.5 to 2.0°C. The maximum effective conductivity achieved could reach up to 111kW/m•°C. The heat pipe was obviously affected by the filling ratio in some cases but the influence law is irregular and related to inclination angles and heating temperatures. Not all OHPs operated well in the limiting case of a zero inclination angle. In most cases, the optimal value of the inclination angle went up when the heating temperature increased. An appropriate high heating temperature is helpful for the OHP to achieved excellent performances. The startup temperature varied from 40°C to 50°C without considering the horizontal heating mode.


2011 ◽  
Vol 396-398 ◽  
pp. 250-254 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fu Min Shang ◽  
Jian Hong Liu ◽  
Deng Ying Liu

The objective of this article is to provide the heat transfer characteristics of Cu-H2O nanofluids in self-exciting mode oscillating-flow heat pipe under different laser heating input, and to compare with the heat transfer characteristics of the same heat pipe with distilled water as working fluids. In this paper, the peculiarity of heat transfer rate of the SEMOS heat pipe with Cu-H2O fluid has been experimentally confirmed by changing the proportion of working fluid and Cu nanoscale particles in the heat pipe. As the results, it has been confirmed that the parameter of filling rate of working fluid determine the heat transfer rate of SEMOS heat pipe, although under certain condition heat transfer performance could be improved because of the addition of nanofluids.


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