Design and fabrication of a 3-D printable counter-flow/precipitation heat exchanger for use with a novel off-grid solid state refrigeration system
Date
2016
Authors
Ryan, Sean Thomas, author
Marchese, Anthony, advisor
Kirkpatrick, Allan, committee member
Sharvelle, Sybil, committee member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Abstract
Off-grid refrigeration technologies are currently limited to either vapor-compression cycles driven by photovoltaics or solar thermal absorption cycles. Rebound Technologies has recently developed a novel off-grid refrigeration system called SunchillTM for agricultural applications in humid environments in the developing world. The SunchillTM refrigeration system utilizes the daily high and low temperatures to drive a 24 hour refrigeration cycle. Cooling is provided by the dissolution of an endothermic salt, sodium carbonate decahydrate. Once the salt is solvated and cooling is delivered to freshly harvest crops, the system is “recharged” in a multi-step process that relies on a solar collector, an air-gap membrane unit and a heat exchanger. The heat exchanger, which is the focus of this thesis, is required to remove 36.6 MJ of heat over a twelve hour period in order to “recharge” the system. The heat exchanger is also required to transfer heat from a fresh water stream to a cold brine solution to generate the cold water necessary to submerse and cool harvested crops. To provide a sustainable technology to the target community, the feasibility of fabricating the heat exchanger via the low cost 3-D printing method of fused filament fabrication (FFF) was examined. This thesis presents the design, development, and manufacturing considerations that were performed in support of developing a waterproof, counter-flow, 3-D printable heat exchanger. Initial geometries and performance were modeled by constructing a linear thermal resistance network with truncating temperatures of 30°C (saturated brine temperature) and 18°C (average daily low temperature). The required surface area of the heat exchanger was found to be 20.46 m2 to remove the required 36.6 MJ of heat. Iterative print tests were conducted to arrive at the wall thickness, hexagon shape, and double wall structure of the heat exchanger. A laboratory-scale heat exchanger was fabricated using a Lulzbot Taz 4 printer from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) polymer. Performance was verified empirically for the laboratory-scale unit. A heat transfer rate of 22.8 W was obtained at a flow rate of 0.00075 kg/s. The results of this thesis demonstrate the feasibility of manufacturing low cost heat exchangers using additive manufacturing techniques.