A Theoretical Dynamic Analysis of a Regenerative Heat Exchanger Assembly in a Fluctuating Flow Regime

A fluctuating flow was used to investigate the thermo-fluid characteristic of a regenerative heat exchanger assembly designed, modelled, built and constructed for the used in Stifling engines applications. Vibration of the regenerative heat exchanger assembly was a problem to deal with during the experimental investigation. Hence, a dynamic analysis of the regenerative heat exchanger assembly was undertaken. The main sources of excitation in vibrations of the regenerative heat exchanger assembly were investigated and calculated based initially on the empirical correlations provided in the literature. Thereafter, a mathematical model of the regenerative heat exchanger assembly was developed based on the energy equations for each moving part of the assembly. The kinetic and potential energy equations were formulated for each moving part of the regenerative heat exchanger assembly. From the kinetic and potential equations, the Lag, range operator was defined, and then the Lagrange formulations were used to derive the differential equations representing the dynamic behavior of each moving part of the assembly. The differential equations were integrated to determine the system natural frequencies. These were then compared to the frequency on excitation in vibrations in order to predict the regenerative heat exchanger working conditions despite the existence of vibration in the system.

Thermal-structural analysis of regeneratively-cooled thrust chamber wall in reusable LOX/Methane rocket engines

To predict the thermal and structural responses of the thrust chamber wall under cyclic work,a 3-D fluid-structural coupling computational methodology is developed.The thermal and mechanical loads are determined by a validated 3-D finite volume fluid-thermal coupling computational method.With the specified loads,the nonlinear thermal-structural finite element analysis is applied to obtaining the 3-D thermal and structural responses.The Chaboche nonlinear kinematic hardening model calibrated by experimental data is adopted to predict the cyclic plastic behavior of the inner wall.The methodology is further applied to the thrust chamber of LOX/Methane rocket engines.The results show that both the maximum temperature at hot run phase and the maximum circumferential residual strain of the inner wall appear at the convergent part of the chamber.Structural analysis for multiple work cycles reveals that the failure of the inner wall may be controlled by the low-cycle fatigue when the Chaboche model parameter c3= 0,and the damage caused by the thermal-mechanical ratcheting of the inner wall cannot be ignored when c3〉 0.The results of sensitivity analysis indicate that mechanical loads have a strong influence on the strains in the inner wall.

Experimental and numerical investigation of a solar eductorassisted low-pressure water desalination system

Greenhouse solar-energy driven desalination technology is potentially well suited for supplying water and small scale irrigation in remote and/or rural areas, and for avoiding over-exploitation of available water resources. The efficiency and productivity of these systems are however low, in part because the heat of evaporation has to be transferred as waste heat to ambient air during condensation. In order to maximize energy regeneration during condensation we propose an educator based system that lowers the evaporation process temperature by reducing pressure. The feasibility of the educator assisted passive solar desalination system is investigated using a detailed computational fluid dynamics analysis complemented by experiments. The study focuses in particular on the ability of the new design to lower the required evaporation temperature and thereby reduce the energy intensity of the process. Two configurations, with open and closed educator, are investigated and a detailed analysis of the thermofluid processes is presented. The configuration with a closed educator installed outside the evaporation chamber shows very promising performance. The proposed system can maintain the maximum temperature and pressure in theevaporation chamber below the desirable temperature and pressure thresholds （30 ℃ and 5 kPa）. The analysis and experimental data also show it is possible to further reduce energy requirements by reducing the motive water flow rates.

Design and engineering implementation of non-supplementary fired compressed air energy storage system: TICC-500

The integration and accommodation of the wind and solar energy pose great challenges on today’s power system operation due to the intermittent nature and volatility of the wind and solar resources.High efficient large-scale electrical energy storage is one of the most effective and economical solutions to those problems.After the comprehensive review of the existing storage technologies,this paper proposes an overall design scheme for the Non-supplementary Fired Compressed Air Energy Storage(NFCAES)system,including system design,modeling and efficiency assessment,as well as protection and control.Especially,the design principles of the multistage regenerative,i.e.heat recovery system which is used to fully recycle and utilize the waste heat from compression are provided,so as the overall system efficiency evaluation method.This paper theoretically ascertains the storage decoupling rules in the potential and internal energy of molecular compressed air and reveals the conversion mechanism of gas,heat,power,electricity and other forms of energy.On this basis,a 500-k W physical simulation system of CAES system(TICC-500,Tsinghua-IPCCAS-CEPRI-CAES)is built,which passed a system-wide 420-k W load power generation test with less pollution and zero carbon emissions.Besides,the multi-form energy conversion of multi-stage regenerative CAES and storage efficiency is verified,especially its incomparable superiority in solving the uncertainty problem in wind and solar power generation.Finally,the propaganda and application scenario of the CAES system in China is introduced.

Design and experimental research of a sub-Newton N_(2)O monopropellant thruster with inner-heater

Nitrous oxide(N_(2)O)is a green propellant with excellent application prospects.A subNewton N_(2)O monopropellant thruster with inner-heater and a N_(2)O self-pressurization stable supply system with regenerative heat compensation are designed in this paper.The experimental research of the thruster is described,including measurements of preheating power,activation temperature,vacuum thrust,specific impulse,life-span and pulsed operation performance.By inserting the heater into the catalyst-bed,preheating efficiency of the heater is significantly improved compared to the thruster with outer-heater.Thus,the preheating power demand of the thruster is successfully reduced to around 10 W.The mean vacuum thrust of 322 mN is attained and the corresponding specific impulse reaches 162s at the mass flow rate of 0.2 g/s.Successful activation temperature of 523 K is achieved,and the activation performance of the thruster is affected by the loading factor.A long term hot-firing test longer than 12000 s is attained.The pulsed operation performance of the inner-preheating thruster is also studied by measuring chamber pressure.Impulses with different magnitudes are produced by adjusting the opening duration of the control valve.A minimum impulse of 81 mN·s is attained.Finally,the performance of the thruster is evaluated by comparison with other thrusters of the same type.The results indicate that the proposed thruster with inner-heater is superior in terms of preheating power,activation temperature and specific impulse performance.