Laminar-flow Liquid-to-air Heat Exchangers - Energy-efficient Display Cabinet Applications
type: CreativeWork
description: Provisions are stored and displayed in supermarkets and grocery stores, at a temperature lower than the ambient, in display cabinets, which are responsible for a significant amount of the energy use in this sector. During the 1990s, major changes in the regulations governing the use of synthetic refrigerants took place in Sweden. This resulted in many refrigeration systems being converted to systems with indirect cooling by means of a liquid secondary refrigerant. The cooling coil is an important component in a display cabinet and traditionally, different kinds of tube-coils, with aluminium fins on expanded circular copper tubes, have been used. Many secondary heat transfer media have relatively high viscosities at low tem¬peratures, and so the flow regime is often laminar, which may lead to poor heat transfer. However, it is possible to achieve high heat transfer coefficients even for laminar flows if an ap¬propriate design of the heat exchanger is applied. Flat-tube heat exchangers have been used for a long time in automotive applications, where compactness is important. The display cabinet application involves low air velocities in combination with condensation of water vapour, and sometimes even frosting, and is therefore different from other applications where flat-tube heat exchangers have been used earlier. The objective of this research work has been to find a suitable, more energy-efficient, heat exchanger design for indirectly cooled display cabinets. An efficiency that would mean that temperature differences would be so small that frosting could be avoided was aimed for. This research work has sandwiched experimental investigations with theoretical modelling and parameter studies. Initially, the heat transfer and pressure drop performance of conventional cooling coils operating with liquid secondary refrigerants was studied in full-scale experiments. Thereafter, the liquid-side (or tube-side) heat transfer was studied experimentally in small-scale experim…
abstract: Provisions are stored and displayed in supermarkets and grocery stores, at a temperature lower than the ambient, in display cabinets, which are responsible for a significant amount of the energy use in this sector. During the 1990s, major changes in the regulations governing the use of synthetic refrigerants took place in Sweden. This resulted in many refrigeration systems being converted to systems with indirect cooling by means of a liquid secondary refrigerant. The cooling coil is an important component in a display cabinet and traditionally, different kinds of tube-coils, with aluminium fins on expanded circular copper tubes, have been used. Many secondary heat transfer media have relatively high viscosities at low tem¬peratures, and so the flow regime is often laminar, which may lead to poor heat transfer. However, it is possible to achieve high heat transfer coefficients even for laminar flows if an ap¬propriate design of the heat exchanger is applied. Flat-tube heat exchangers have been used for a long time in automotive applications, where compactness is important. The display cabinet application involves low air velocities in combination with condensation of water vapour, and sometimes even frosting, and is therefore different from other applications where flat-tube heat exchangers have been used earlier. The objective of this research work has been to find a suitable, more energy-efficient, heat exchanger design for indirectly cooled display cabinets. An efficiency that would mean that temperature differences would be so small that frosting could be avoided was aimed for. This research work has sandwiched experimental investigations with theoretical modelling and parameter studies. Initially, the heat transfer and pressure drop performance of conventional cooling coils operating with liquid secondary refrigerants was studied in full-scale experiments. Thereafter, the liquid-side (or tube-side) heat transfer was studied experimentally in small-scale experim…
author: Haglund Stignor, Caroline
language: eng
keywords: Energy Engineering, energy-efficiency, indirect cooling, display cabinet, pressure drop, heat transfer, flat-tube heat exchanger, cooling coil, laminar
date published: 2009
date modified: 2026-07-24T02:59:36Z
provider: University of Lund
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Faculty of Engineering, Department of Energy Sciences, Division of Heat Transfer