Experimental investigation on paraffin melting in high porosity copper foam under centrifugal accelerations

Abstract

Phase change materials (PCM) are promising for wide ranging applications in thermal control of electronics due to the remarkable thermal energy storage capacity. The solid-liquid phase change process is coupled with acceleration for applications in aerospace, which tends to induce unstable heat transfer phenomenon in the latent heat thermal energy storage system (LHTESS). In this study, to further explore the PCM melting characteristics under different centrifugal accelerations, an experimental apparatus was developed on a centrifuge, and the evolution of the solid-liquid interface and temperature distribution of the composite PCM was obtained. The experimental findings concluded that the centrifugal acceleration had a remarkable influence on the phase change process of PCM. The convection of the liquid paraffin and correspondingly heat transfer coefficient of the composite PCM were strengthened with increasing the centrifuge acceleration. Moreover, as observed through the asymmetric solid-liquid interface and evolutionary temperature distribution, the non-uniform thermal conductance of the composite PCM along with the centrifugal acceleration could be induced by the convection of the liquid PCM, and the non-uniform thermal state was further enhanced with increasing the centrifugal acceleration.