Experimental Characterization of an Additively Manufactured Inconel 718 Heat Exchanger for High-Temperature Applications
Author:
Battaglia Fabio1, Arie Martinus1, Zhang Xiang1ORCID, Ohadi Michael1, Shooshtari Amir1ORCID
Affiliation:
1. Advanced Heat Exchangers and Process Intensification Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Abstract
This work presents the experimental results of a novel, air-to-air, additively manufactured manifold-microchannel heat exchanger with straight fins on both sides. The heat exchanger was made of Inconel 718 using a direct metal laser sintering technique. The overall core size of the heat exchanger was 94 mm × 87.6 mm × 94.4 mm, with a fin thickness of 0.220 mm on both the hot and cold sides. The heat exchanger was tested with pressurized nitrogen gas at 300 °C and 340 kPa for the hot side, while air at an ambient condition was used for the cold side. An overall heat transfer of 276 W/m2K was obtained for Reynolds number values of 132 and 79 for the cold and hot sides, respectively. A gravimetric heat transfer density (Q/m∆T) of 4.7–6.7 W/kgK and a volumetric heat transfer density (Q/V∆T) of 6.9–9.8 kW/m3K were recorded for this heat exchanger with a coefficient of performance value that varied from 42 to 52 over the operating conditions studied here. The experimental pressure drop results were within 10% of the numerical values, while the corresponding heat transfer results were within 17% of the numerical results, mainly due to imperfections in the fabrication process. Despite this penalty, the performance of the tested heat exchanger was superior to the conventional plate-fin heat exchangers: more than 60% of improvements in both gravimetric and volumetric heat transfer densities were recorded for the entire range of experimental data.
Funder
US Department of Energy, ARPA-E division
Subject
Energy (miscellaneous),Energy Engineering and Power Technology,Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment,Electrical and Electronic Engineering,Control and Optimization,Engineering (miscellaneous),Building and Construction
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