A 3D-printed full-soft regenerative elastocaloric cooler

IF 9.9 1区工程技术 Q1 ENERGY & FUELS

Energy Conversion and Management Pub Date : 2025-05-05 DOI:10.1016/j.enconman.2025.119811

Kun Wang, Kurt Engelbrecht, Christian R.H. Bahl, Rasmus Bjørk

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Elastocaloric cooling employing soft elastomers represents a path to reduce the climate impacts associated with conventional vapor compression refrigeration. The use of soft elastomers enhances efficiency, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness of elastocaloric systems, while significantly reducing the driving force for promising low-stress elastocaloric cooling. This study presents fully 3D-printed soft elastomeric regenerators featuring parallel plate and square channel designs, operating under 5.5–7.7 MPa. The 3D-printed elastomer exhibits an adiabatic temperature change of 2.3 K upon unloading at 600% strain. The 3D-printed elastomers were used to build a regenerative elastocaloric cooler featuring automatic fluid compensation to address large strain-induced volume changes in fluid channels, which resulted in enhanced cooling performance. The cooler achieves a 4.7 K temperature span (regeneration ratio: 2.04) in a square-microchannel regenerator and delivers a maximum specific cooling power of 1850 W/kg. Utilizing additive manufacturing for rapid prototyping of microchannel regenerators, this work demonstrates a scalable and commercially viable approach to low-force elastocaloric cooling.

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一个3d打印的全软再生弹性热冷却器

采用软弹性体的弹性热冷却代表了减少与传统蒸汽压缩制冷相关的气候影响的途径。软弹性体的使用提高了弹性热系统的效率、灵活性和成本效益，同时显著降低了低应力弹性热冷却的驱动力。这项研究展示了全3d打印的软弹性蓄热器，具有平行板和方形通道设计，工作在5.5-7.7 MPa下。在600%应变下卸载时，3d打印弹性体的绝热温度变化为2.3 K。3d打印弹性体用于构建具有自动流体补偿功能的再生弹性热冷却器，以解决流体通道中应变引起的大体积变化，从而提高冷却性能。该冷却器在方形微通道再生器中实现4.7 K温度跨度（再生比：2.04），最大比冷却功率为1850 W/kg。利用增材制造进行微通道再生器的快速原型设计，这项工作展示了一种可扩展和商业上可行的低力弹性热冷却方法。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Energy Conversion and Management 工程技术-力学

CiteScore

19.00

自引率

11.50%

发文量

1304

审稿时长

17 days

期刊介绍： The journal Energy Conversion and Management provides a forum for publishing original contributions and comprehensive technical review articles of interdisciplinary and original research on all important energy topics. The topics considered include energy generation, utilization, conversion, storage, transmission, conservation, management and sustainability. These topics typically involve various types of energy such as mechanical, thermal, nuclear, chemical, electromagnetic, magnetic and electric. These energy types cover all known energy resources, including renewable resources (e.g., solar, bio, hydro, wind, geothermal and ocean energy), fossil fuels and nuclear resources.