Vivek A Raut
Department of Mechanical Engineering

University of Bridgeport, Connecticut

Current research efforts on refrigeration systems which are focusing on the development of alternative refrigerants and alternative technologies to reduce environmental impact such as vapor absorption refrigeration, or vapor compression etc. Thermoacoustics refrigeration (TAR) is a comparatively new cooling technology, which offers a revolutionary solution for the current problems of energy consumption and which does not require any moving parts or harmful refrigerants in its operation. This technology uses acoustic waves to pump heat across the stack (temperature gradient). The stack forms the heart of the refrigerator where the heat-pumping process takes place, and it is thus an important element which determines the performance of the refrigerator. The research work proposes a multi-objective design approach to improve the detailed study of the impact of Stack Geometry on performance of Thermoacoustics refrigeration. This study aims to optimize the geometric variables namely the stack material, optimal stack spacing, pore geometry, and stack lengths involved in designing of Thermoacoustics refrigeration system. The performance characteristics of this class of Thermoacoustics refrigerators are modeled by using CAD software (SolidWorks) and the analysis is carried out using FEA methods for various stack positions. Furthermore, the experiments on the system were conducted by operating the TAR system at 1 bar gauge pressure & then in second phase the operating pressure was increased to 2 bar gauge pressure to find out the suitable stack lengths and positions in resonator tube. It is concluded that the TAR system can work much more efficiently at higher pressures for calculated Stack length & center positions

Corresponding Author: Vivek A. Raut, vraut@my.bridgeport.edu