Numerical investigation of the new phase shifter for pulse tube refrigerator - inertance tube combining with step-piston

Abstract

A new phase shifter which is the combination of the inertance tube and step piston coming from the step piston pulse tube refrigerator (SP–PTR) is studied with numerical simulation. The SP–PTR is a modification of the inertance tube pulse tube refrigerator for recovering the expansion work to increase the theoretical efficiency. The mechanism of the acoustic power transfer and phase shifting ability of this new phase shifter should be understood as a key point of this type of refrigerator. The commercial CFD software ANSYS Fluent is used for studying. This new phase shifter can transfer acoustic power with a relative high efficiency with a suitable phase relationship, which is also verified in the SP-PTR model. This means the SP-PTR has the potential to achieve a good performance with only one moving part.