Quantification of liquid refrigerant distribution in parallel flow microchannel heat exchanger using infrared thermography

Huize Li, Pega Hrnjak

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

This paper presents a method to quantify the distribution of liquid refrigerant mass flow rate in a parallel flow microchannel heat exchanger from the infrared images. Quantification is achieved by building the relationship between the liquid mass flow rate through each microchannel tube and the air-side capacity calculated from the infrared measurement of the wall temperature. After being implemented in a heat exchanger model, the quantification method is validated against experimental data. This method can be used for several types of heat exchangers: evaporators, condensers, gas-coolers, etc., also it can be applied to various heat exchanger designs: different inlet/outlet locations, different flow configurations, etc.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)410-418
Number of pages9
JournalApplied Thermal Engineering
Volume78
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 5 2015

Keywords

  • Infrared thermography
  • Microchannel heat exchanger
  • Quantification
  • Refrigerant distribution

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Energy Engineering and Power Technology
  • Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

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