Numerical predictions of thermodynamic cycle and thermal efficiency of thermal-lag Stirling engine

Abstract

This study is aimed at development of a numerical model for predicting thermodynamic cycle and thermal efficiency of thermal-lag Stirling engine Thermal-lag Stirling engine is working through the principle of thermal-lag instability phenomenon In thermal-lag engine piston is the only moving part So the configuration of this engine is simpler when compared to other traditional Stirling engine A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) numerical simulation method is used to predict the transient variations of pressure temperature and working fluid mass in the individual working spaces of the engine A parametric study of the effect of working gas pressure heating temperature cooling temperature regenerator porosity and rotation speed on the performance of thermal-lag Stirling engine is carried out Also the numerical simulation of engine power output torque and the thermal efficiency has been computed with the different operating speed heating temperature cooling temperature and the working gas pressure The optimum engine speed at which the engine can reach the maximum power output and thermal efficiency has been determined With the help of numerical simulation the thermal-lag engine performance was analyzed with the different operating conditions

Date of Award	2017 Feb 6
Original language	English
Supervisor	Chin-Hsiang Cheng (Supervisor)