BOUNDARY ELEMENT APPROACH TO TRANSIENT HEAT PIPE ANALYSIS

Abstract

A transient heat pipe was modeled by a quasi steady state one-dimensional vapor flow and a transient two-dimensional wall and wick heat conduction. The assumption of quasi steady state vapor was based on the fact that the vapor dynamics have a much smaller timescale than the wall conduction. A boundary element method was proposed to solve the transient two-dimensional heat conduction problem. The vapor flow dynamics was solved by a numerical approach, including two iterative “estimate-correction” processes. Comparisons with previous experimented and numerical studies verified the model and the solution methods. This work provides an effective means of transient heat pipe analysis.

Notes

Address correspondence to Professor Amir Faghri, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Connecticut, 191 Auditorium Road, Storrs, CT 06269-3139, USA. E-mail:[email protected]