Drawn Polymer Fiber Recuperative Heat Exchangers
Polymer microchannel heat exchangers for use in cryocooler applications have been developed. These heat exchangers are manufactured using a thermal drawing process where a bulk polymer preform is heated and stretched. The process results in channels with a characteristic dimension of 50-100 µm and w...
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| Format: | Thesis |
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Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2022
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/139959 |
| Summary: | Polymer microchannel heat exchangers for use in cryocooler applications have been developed. These heat exchangers are manufactured using a thermal drawing process where a bulk polymer preform is heated and stretched. The process results in channels with a characteristic dimension of 50-100 µm and with an overall length of many meters. The drawn heat exchangers are lightweight, flexible, and have a large surface-area-to-volume ratio. Initial tests on a Joule-Thomson cryocooler with a heat exchanger of overall dimension of 2.5mm x 2.5mm x 400mm with nitrogen as a working fluid were performed. Nitrogen was successfully liquefied with a mass flow rate of 34 mg/s and cooling power of 200 mW at 80 K. |
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