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Structural Optimization of the Inlet Header of Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Printed Circuit Board Heat Exchanger

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Abstract

Supercritical carbon dioxide printed circuit board heat exchangers are expected to be applied in third-generation solar thermal power generation. However, the uniformity of supercritical carbon dioxide entering the heat exchanger has a significant impact on the overall performance of the heat exchanger. In order to improve the uniformity of flow distribution in the inlet header. This article studies and optimizes the inlet header of a printed circuit board heat exchanger through numerical simulation. The results indicate that when supercritical carbon dioxide flows through the header cavity, eddy currents will be generated, which will increase the uneven distribution of flow rate, while reducing the generation of eddy currents will improve the uniform distribution of flow rate. When the dimensionless factor of the inlet header is 6, the hyperbolic configuration is the optimal structure. We also reduced the eddy current region by adding transition segments, and the results showed that the structure was the best when the dilation angle was 10°, which reduced the non-uniformity by 21% compared to the hyperbolic configuration, providing guidance for engineering practice.

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Acknowledgment

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 52076006) and National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2022YFB4202402).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. MOE Key Laboratory of Enhanced Heat Transfer and Energy Conservation, Bei**g Key Laboratory of Heat Transfer and Energy Conversion, Bei**g University of Technology, Bei**g, 100124, China

    Yanquan Wang, Yuanwei Lu, Yuanyuan Wang, **nlong Han, Yuting Wu & Qi Gao

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  1. Yanquan Wang
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  2. Yuanwei Lu
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  3. Yuanyuan Wang
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  4. **nlong Han
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Correspondence to Yuanwei Lu.

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Wang, Y., Lu, Y., Wang, Y. et al. Structural Optimization of the Inlet Header of Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Printed Circuit Board Heat Exchanger. J. Therm. Sci. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11630-024-2002-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11630-024-2002-4

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