Effect of noble-gas mixtures on the performance of regenerative-type cryocoolers: Analytical estimate

Technical Report · Sat Sep 01 04:00:00 EDT 1990

OSTI ID:5899926

Daney, D E

The authors compare the performance of regenerators that use noble gas mixtures to the performance of those that use pure helium gas. Both helium-argon and helium-krypton mixtures are investigated. For some heat transfer surfaces, a modest gain in heat transfer can be achieved with these mixtures. The concomitant increase in pressure drop, however, more than offsets the heat transfer gain so the net regenerator loss increases for all cases they evaluated. The dependence of heat transfer on Prandtl number (Pr) has not been measured for the range associated with noble gas mixtures, 0.2 < Pr < 0.5, and they estimate that the uncertainty from the source can exceed 20 percent. The authors give the estimates for the transport properties (Prandtl number, viscosity, and thermal conductivity) of helium-argon and helium-krypton mixtures because of the absence of experimental data at low temperature.

• Research Organization: National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NML), Boulder, CO (USA). Chemical Engineering Science Div.
• OSTI ID: 5899926
• Report Number(s): PB-91-144410/XAB; NISTIR--90/3936
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

420201* -- Engineering-- Cryogenic Equipment &amp; Devices
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ARGON
BINARY MIXTURES
COOLING
CRYOGENICS
DISPERSIONS
ELEMENTS
ENERGY TRANSFER
FLUIDS
GASES
GRAPHS
HEAT EXCHANGERS
HEAT TRANSFER
HELIUM
KRYPTON
MIXTURES
NONMETALS
PERFORMANCE
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
PRANDTL NUMBER
RARE GASES
REGENERATORS
THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY
THERMODYNAMIC PROPERTIES
VISCOSITY