Experimental investigation of an adjustable thermoacoustically-driven thermoacoustic refrigerator

Abstract

An experimental investigation is conducted on a new adjustable thermoacoustically-driven thermoacoustic refrigerator (TADTAR). This refrigerator comprises of a thermoacoustic engine which drives a thermoacoustic refrigerator. This study aims to demonstrate the possibility to alter the TADTAR performance through the adjustment of specific design parameters. An adjustable resonator, which consisted of stacks, spacing couplings and shell-tube heat exchangers was designed and built. Six different honeycomb ceramic stacks were investigated. For each system, three different stack configurations were studied. Measurements of temperature difference across the refrigerator stack and sound pressure levels at steady states were used to determine the performance of the device. Through the adjustment of the length and the insertion of the heat exchanger, the performance of the device with a longer resonator was relatively higher. This study shows that an adjustable resonator successfully alters the frequency output of the thermoacoustic engine to match the frequency required by the thermoacoustic refrigerator and achieve resonance. In addition, this study demonstrates the possibility to change the geometrical configuration of the device and ultimately alter the performance of the TADTAR. Through the adjustment of the length of the resonator, this study shows that a single device could have different operating points. This creates new possibilities to introduce control system able to adjust the geometry of thermoacoustic system while in operation.