Study On An Auto-cascade Absorption Refrigeration Cycle

As absorption refrigeration machine can work by using low-grade energy as its power, a number of research options such as various types of absorption refrigeration systems, research on working fluids, especially improvement of absorption processes have been made recently. Because traditional refrigeration machines have causticity, toxicity, and easy blowing up, and can't obtain lower refrigeration temperatures, the application field is limited. In this paper, a study on an auto-cascade absorption refrigeration cycle is provided. The new cycle can resolve the above problems by utilizing low thermal potential energy. In addition, the new cycle can use environment-friendly working substances.Firstly, a systematic research on this new cycle was carried out theoretically with R32+R134a/DMF (dimethyl formamide) as working fluids. The results show that this new cycle can achieve -35C refrigeration temperature under 140C generation temperature, which is much lower than those obtained by traditional absorption ones.In addition, in order to investigate the performance of this new cycle, a set of experimental apparatus was designed and set up, a series of experiments using R32+R134a/DMF as working fluids were carried out. In these experiments, this new cycle shows not only its ability to get low refrigerating temperatures but its potential in utilizing low thermal potential energy as driving power.Since the theoretical and experimental studies on this new auto-cascade absorption refrigeration cycle is in the beginning phase, some problems have been found and have not been solved until now. The author summarizes them at the end of this thesis, and provides some suggestions in improving its performance, which will be useful for future studies.