Numerical Study on Refrigeration Characteristics of Refrigerated Cabinet Based on SIMPLE Algorithm

Wenbo Liu^1, , Tianyun Liu² and Yutong He³

¹School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Guangdong Eco-engineering Polytechnic, Guangzhou 510520, China

²Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

³Shenzhen International Graduate School, Tsinghua University, Shenzhen 518055, China

Cite this paper:
Wenbo Liu, Tianyun Liu and Yutong He. Numerical Study on Refrigeration Characteristics of Refrigerated Cabinet Based on SIMPLE Algorithm. American Journal of Mechanical Engineering. 2023; 11(3):107-114. doi: 10.12691/ajme-11-3-2

Abstract

In order to study the refrigeration characteristics of the refrigerated cabinet, a refrigeration characteristic analysis program based on the SIMPLE algorithm was developed using Fortran. The working condition was simulated and verified. The results show that the simulation results of the refrigeration characteristic analysis program developed with Fortran are basically consistent with the results carried out by commercial CFD Fluent software. In the early stage of the refrigeration process, due to the low temperature of the evaporator coil, the air near the evaporator coil was cooled first, and the density increased, resulting in a downward flow. Driven by natural convection, the air temperature inside the refrigerated cabinet gradually decreased, and at the same time, a large-scale vortex was generated in the cavity of the lower part of the refrigerated cabinet. As time progressed, the air in the cabinet was cooled to a certain extent, the air temperature difference in different regions decreased, the temperature gradient in the cabinet decreased, and the intensity of natural convection decreased. Finally, the temperature dropped to 278.15K and remained unchanged.

Keywords:
refrigeration characteristics refrigerated cabinet SIMPLE algorithm numerical simulation Fortran program Fluent software

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