Jian Chen
Department of Mechanical Engineering University of Texas at Arlington Arlington, Texas 76019, U.S.A.; Visiting Scholar from The Department of Energy Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, P.R. of CHINA
David Y. S. Lou
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA; Department of Mechanical Engineering University of Texas at Arlington Arlington, Texas 76019, U.S.A.
Chuanjing Tu
Department of Energy Engineering Zhejiang University Hangzhou, P.R. of CHINA
In this study, the evaporation heat transfer characteristics of three types of parallel and inclined cylindrical rotating heat pipes are experimentally investigated. The effects of centrifugal acceleration on the evaporation heat transfer and the circumferential temperature distribution in the evaporator section of the heat pipe are studied. The relationship between the average evaporation heat transfer coefficient and the centrifugal acceleration is obtained.
The experimental results indicate that there is a starting rotational speed below which steady state operation is impossible for all three types of heat pipes investigated. The starting rotational speed is related to the power input, the geometry and the installed position of the heat pipe. Further, the evaporation heat transfer coefficients of all three types of heat pipes decrease with the increasing of centrifugal acceleration.