Experimental study of adoption of alternative refrigerant for avionic equipment cooling system

Abstract

A cooling system is adopted to control the thermal load from the avionic equipments in an aircraft for stable operation. In this study, an avionic cooling system was designed and manufactured by adopting a vapor compression cycle with a closed-loop air-circulation system to investigate the operating characteristics of an alternative refrigerant. The performance characteristics of a cooling system adopting R236fa as an alternative refrigerant were experimentally determined by varying the refrigerant charging amount, expansion valve opening, and compressor rotation speed. The experimental results were analyzed and compared with those of a cooling system adopting R124 as a refrigerant. The possibility of the adoption of R236fa as an alternative refrigerant was verified, and design solutions were suggested to improve the system efficiency. © 2013 The Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers.