Thermal performance of a novel hybrid heat pipe with composite heat transfer characteristics

Abstract

Considering the capillary threshold of oscillating heat pipes (OHP), a novel hybrid heat pipe (HHP) was designed with channels with hydraulic diameters that alternately exceed and fall below this threshold, parallelly arrayed within a unified copper substrate. This technology attains a comprehensive heat transfer performance within the HHP, seamlessly transitioning from pure phase change heat transfer to hybrid pulsating flow heat transfer to effectively accommodate the escalating demands of heat load. Performance and visualization are used to analyze the operational characteristics of HHP. The results indicate that the HHP mainly transfers heat through the phase change in the large channels in lower heat input, while the working fluid in the small channels remains calm. Once the heat input is sufficient, the geyser boiling in the large channels and the liquid slug pulsating in the small channels jointly carry out heat transfer. Furthermore, the liquid content in the large and small channels can be adaptively adjusted to each other. The high-speed liquid in the small channels can be squeezed into the large channels to ensure the sufficient pulsating space and achieve efficient heat transfer under high heat input. In addition, the operation of the HHP can be significantly impacted by the filling ratio (FR). In the phase change stage, the FR of 47.6 % can be considered as the turning point. After transitioning to the hybrid pulsating flow stage, the HHP with low FR can get a better performance. This new type of heat pipe with gradually changing operation characteristics may be critical to solve thermal problems in variable heat load domain.