Experimental investigation on the thermal performance of a novel thermosyphon heat pipe with truncated cone for heat recovery systems

Abstract

A Thermosyphon Heat Pipe (THP) is an effective heat transfer device primarily deployed in the field of energy conversion and heat recovery systems. Among the various working fluids, deionized (DI) water exerts higher latent heat of vaporization making it suitable for efficient performance testing of THPs. The novel design of a THP in a non-uniform geometry-based truncated cone structure is suggested to recover waste heat from various sources. A detailed parametric study is carried out on the non-uniform structure THPs to analyze the thermal performance. This study examines the thermal performance of the Convergent Truncated Cone (CTC) THP and the effect of modifying the influencing factors of its diameter, length, heat flux, inclinations, and mass flow rate. Based on the experimental results, it is seen that the CTC helps to reduce the overall thermal resistance by 48.94 %, 35.15 %, and 34.69 % for 90°, 60°, and 30° inclinations, respectively. Similarly, the temperature difference between the evaporator and the adiabatic sections shows an average thermal resistance reduction of 36.38 %, 30.3 %, and 55.82 % under the same operating conditions. Additionally, the results of the current investigation indicate that there are two positive outcomes for the supplied heat input range of 30–300 W. It is observed that the THP is 2.54 % more efficient than a conventional THP at an angle of 90° for a heat input range of 30–150 W. The maximum augmentation of thermal efficiency is noted to be 4.12 % and is attained at 30° inclination for the input range of 180–300 W.