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Additive design and manufacturing of a composite polymer heat exchanger.

Number: pap. 2309

Author(s) : BOXLEITNER J., NELLIS G.

Summary

The application of additive manufacturing to heat exchangers allows an unparalleled freedom in design. Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) is a relatively low cost additive manufacturing process that involves depositing thermoplastic material layer by layer. The coupling of FFF with numerical models of air-side thermal fluid behavior has led to a novel, compact, high performance heat exchanger design that has been manufactured and validated experimentally. The heat exchanger features water and air in cross flow with various fin arrays on the air-side. Design paths towards cost and performance targets that will allow this technology to be competitive with industry targets have been identified and include: better understanding for manufacturing process constraints, filled material development, and air-side convection improvements. In the FFF process, physical geometrical constraints such as extrusion nozzle diameter and layer height have implications on thermal performance, overall resistance to heat transfer, and manufacturability. Typical thermoplastic thermal conductivities are 100 to 1000 times smaller than that of the aluminum and copper used in industry standard heat exchangers. Efforts to manufacture polymers that are filled with conductive materials such as carbon fiber, aluminum flakes, and graphite aim to decrease this gap by an order of magnitude. To be competitive with traditional air-cooled heat exchangers with material that is much less conductive, air-side convection optimization using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has been utilized to implement and validate advanced air-side geometries. An FFF manufactured heat exchanger that is cost and performance competitive with traditionally manufactured heat exchangers will open the door to a future in air-cooled systems that currently does not exist. This technology will allow heat exchangers to become lighter and fit in a smaller envelope as well as result in rapid replacement, high customization, increased fouling resistance and provide other secondary advantages.

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Pages: 10

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Details

  • Original title: Additive design and manufacturing of a composite polymer heat exchanger.
  • Record ID : 30024491
  • Languages: English
  • Source: 2018 Purdue Conferences. 17th International Refrigeration and Air-Conditioning Conference at Purdue.
  • Publication date: 2018/07/09

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