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Illinois researchers demonstrate extreme heat exchanger with additive manufacturing:
Used in most major industries – including energy, water, manufacturing, transportation, construction, electronic, chemical, petrochemical, agriculture and aerospace – heat exchangers transfer thermal energy from one medium to another.
For decades, heat exchanger designs have remained relatively unchanged. Recent advancements in 3D printing allow the production of three-dimensional exchanger designs previously thought impossible. These new and innovative designs operate significantly more effectively and efficiently but require specific software tools and design methods to manufacture the high-performance devices.
[...] "We developed shape optimization software to design a high-performance heat exchanger," said William King, professor of Mechanical Science and Engineering at The Grainger College of Engineering and co-study leader. "The software allows us to identity 3D designs that are significantly different and better than conventional designs."
The team started by studying a type of exchanger known as a tube-in-tube heat exchanger – where one tube is nested inside another tube. Tube-in-tube heat exchangers are commonly used in drinking water and building energy systems. Using a combination of the shape optimization software and additive manufacturing, the researchers designed fins (only made possible using metal 3D printing) internal to the tubes.
"We designed, fabricated and tested an optimized tube-in-tube heat exchanger," said Nenad Miljkovic, associate professor of Mechanical Science and Engineering and co-study leader. "Our optimized heat exchanger has about 20 times higher volumetric power density than a current state-of-the-art commercial tube-in-tube device."
Journal Reference:
Hyunkyu Moon, Davis J. McGregor, Nenad Miljkovic, et al. Ultra-power-dense heat exchanger development through genetic algorithm design and additive manufacturing (DOI: 10.1016/j.joule.2021.08.004)
(Score: 2) by Sourcery42 on Monday September 13 2021, @04:14PM (1 child)
I too would like to see that comparison. I'm not sure about fabrication, but the diagram shown in TFA looks very difficult to effectively mechanically clean. Chemical cleaning can work, but usually there's diminishing returns there and eventually you have to take the heat exchanger apart and clean it. Plate frame exchangers are also incredibly compact and efficient. Plus plate packs can be taken apart, washed down, and squeezed back together with fresh gaskets. This tube-in-tube thing looks more like a very elegant throwaway solution for very clean, and possibly hazardous, services. Industry already has those too https://www.alfalaval.com/products/heat-transfer/plate-heat-exchangers/Welded-plate-and-shell-heat-exchangers/packinox/. [alfalaval.com]
More options is great. Especially if this can make a throwaway exchanger relatively cheaper. I just can't tell from the article if this is quite as novel and innovative as they claim it is. Could just be a squirrel in the room.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday September 13 2021, @07:41PM
That was my very first thought as I read the article. These things had better be cheap enough that you can just replace them routinely. Cleaning chemically should be no different than cleaning a standard tube-in-tube. Hook up some kind of water circulation pump, add acid or alkali to the reservoir, and let it run for however many hours. Rinse, hook up the plumbing again, and return to service. If the chemical cleaning doesn't do the job, you're kinda screwed. Ultrasonic cleaning might work if you have large enough a tank to immerse your heat exchanger, but you're not going to use standard drill driven brushes inside of these tubes.
To be fair and honest, a good water treatment process extends the life of heat exchangers by orders of magnitude. Most of those that I have cleaned were destroyed by impure water with inadequate if any treatment. We expected to clean them between 5 and 7 years of service using city water, but a proper water treatment actually started auto-cleaning exchangers that were already partially blocked with lime and scale. That, and sacrificial anodes, which for some reason, our management thought were too expensive to replace.