Development of a low-cost data acquisition system for a vapor compression refrigeration experimental workbench

Abstract

Refrigeration and air conditioning systems are essential in residential, commercial, and industrial segments. The data acquisition and the control of equipment results in an improvement in efficiency and a decrease in energy consumption, considering that the data obtained bring a better visualization and understanding of the components of the system. This work aims to automate data acquisition from a vapor compression refrigeration workbench by developing a low-cost data acquisition system. The system was developed using Arduino and LabView with the assistance of LINX software. After the communication between the controller and the program, six thermocouples were installed on the refrigeration workbench to acquire the temperatures in the program of the data acquisition system. For reading system pressure values, a camera was used to capture images from six analog pressure gauges. From reading these data, the pressure-enthalpy diagram of the thermodynamic cycle was obtained. The experimental refrigeration workbench has been used in teaching and research activities. The data acquisition system developed for the refrigeration workbench improved the realization of experiments, allowing a better comparison between experimental and theoretical results.

Demonstrating the Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability Using a Low-Cost Experimental Apparatus and Computational Fluid Dynamics Simulations

“…The overall variety of experiments has been limited by the high cost of commercial teaching equipment. We were inspired by several studies that focused on the design and fabrication of low-cost hardware that can be used in thermal-fluid laboratory experiments, as an alternative to purchasing expensive educational equipment [8][9][10][11]. Low-cost custom equipment has been used to demonstrate a wide variety of concepts including heat conduction (axial, radial, and fin) [10], compressible flow [8], and vapor compression refrigeration cycles [11].…”

“…We were inspired by several studies that focused on the design and fabrication of low-cost hardware that can be used in thermal-fluid laboratory experiments, as an alternative to purchasing expensive educational equipment [8][9][10][11]. Low-cost custom equipment has been used to demonstrate a wide variety of concepts including heat conduction (axial, radial, and fin) [10], compressible flow [8], and vapor compression refrigeration cycles [11]. Particle image velocimetry has been used to visually represent stagnation flow around a flat plate, which allowed students to quantitatively analyze video data and compare the experimental results to predicted velocity fields using potential flow theory [9].…”