Study On Air Distribution In Capsule Hotel

Air distribution within spaces plays an important role in ventilation andair-conditioning systems. Reasonable air diffusion can improve IAQ, decrease energyconsumption, and establish comfortable and healthy environment for indoor occupants.Traditionally, there are two distinct airflow patterns to characterize air movement inrooms: mixing ventilation and displacement ventilation. Comprehensive utilization ofthe advantages of both airflow patterns, a new method of air distribution known as theAir Curtain Ventilation (ACV) has been developed by the research group led byProfessor An-gui Li in Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology, to resovle theproblems caused by current air distribution patterns.The air diffuser of ACV system locates on the top space of the room and close to avertical wall. When moving downward from the supply air vent, the supply air can beattached to the vertical wall for the reason of the Coanda effect. The supply air jetimpinges the floor at the wall-floor corner and then separates from the wall andreattaches to the ground surface. ACV can be regarded as a mixing ventilation patternbefore the supply air jet flows into the occupied zone. However, the vertical wall ishelpful for improving the quantity of fresh air and cold/heat load of supply air into theoccupied zone. And then the airflow will spread over the ground in a radial pattern andbehave as a displacement ventilation pattern in the occupied zone. At last, the ACVpattern will create a phenomenon called as air lake or air pool over the floor whichis very beneficial to excellent IAQ and ventilation efficiency.Based on the ACV system, this dissertation has innovatively developed threedifferent supply air patterns in capsule hotel: the Ceiling-Attached Air Jet pattern, theACV pattern of both ceiling ends and the Ceiling Impinging Air Jet pattern. And then the characteristics of air distribution in the three supply air patterns are respectivelystudied to guide the real project. The main research subjects are shown as follows.（1）Based on the analyzing of the theory of plane free jet, plane wall jet andimpinging jet, the airflow structure of the ACV system is modeled.（2）Three different reasonable test model of air distribution in capsule areestablished and studied, by comparison of the theory analysis and real object.（3）The computational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been applied to air distributioncharacteristic analysis of the three distinct supply air patterns. The first part is theoptimization of the three different supply air patterns. And then the influences ofdifferent parameters on air diffusion are respectively studied in the best supply airpattern, obtaining reliable design parameter values in capsule hotel.