Thermodynamic Performance of an Actual Thermo-Acoustic Refrigeration Micro-Cycle

Abstract

Thermo-acoustic refrigerator is a new type of engine, which is based on the thermo-acoustic effect. A new model which expresses as an ellipse in pressure-volume diagram is established to investigate the thermodynamic performance of an actual thermo-acoustic refrigeration micro-cycle. The demarcation points of endothermic processes and exothermic processes in the actual micro-cycle are found. The analytic expressions of the dimensionless cooling load and the coefficient of performance (COP) are deduced. The relationship between the dimensionless cooling load and the COP are investigated by numerical examples. The results show that the dimensionless cooling load is a monotonically increasing function of the COP and the pressure amplitude.