Abstract:
For the last few decades, there has not been any significant increase in the efficiency (i.e., coefficient of performance, COP) of the system. Moreover, with the increasing awareness of environmental degradation, the production, use and disposal of ChloroFluoro Carbons (CFCs) and HydroChloroFluoroCarbons (HCFCs) as refrigerants in mechanical refrigeration system has become a subject of great concern. However, such systems are being developed using more ecofriendly refrigerants viz., air, CO2, NH3, etc. Besides, efforts are being directed to develop other types of refrigeration technologies. So to overcome this problem non-conventional method of refrigeration has been developed and cyclone refrigeration or air cooing by cyclone is one of them, which is using no CFCs & HCFCs which cause ozone layer depletion.
Performance tests on cyclone for cooing of air are studied for different design options and operating conditions are varied during experiment. Response of the system was found to be very high for cooling of air from 35 °C (Inlet) to 23 °C (Outlet) when water is circulated outside the cyclone. when top of the core tube is closed and released intermittently, dramatic temperature drop of is obtained in this case and lowest temperature is obtained is 23 °C, which is 4 — 5 °C lower than the ambient temperature. COP is found to a strong function of cold air discharge. When coolant is used it is observed that COP increase with increase in flow arte, whereas when the coolant is not used, COP found to be invariant with cold air discharge.
The process of cooing by using cyclone principle has been coined as "Cyclone Refrigeration" (Air Cooling by Cyclone).COP of Cyclone — refrigeration was found to be 1.5 — 1.7, when water is circulated outside the cyclone, which is very high in comparison to similar cooling methods like vortex Refrigeration and pulse tube Refrigeration at comparatively high rate of cooling air discharge.
