Project Title:
High Performance Ambient Temperature Heat Pipes
09.08-6551
High Performance Ambient Temperature Heat Pipes
Thermacore Inc.
780 Eden Road
Lancaster
PA
17601
Keddy
Michael D.
NAS8-37261
Amount:
Center: MSFC
NAS8-35269
Abstract:
The goal is to develop a 50 foot (15 m) long ambient temperature compositeheat pipe capable of transporting 5000 W. The aluminum/ammonia heat pipe will be
designed for operation in spec over the temperature range of 0-40C.
The concept selected for development was deemed the most desirable configuration
based on heat transport capability, mass, T, cost, ease of fabrication and integration
with the Thermal Bus. The design based on preliminary tests shows that the heat
pipe will be capable of transporting 8400 W on earth, and accepting a heat flux of
10 W/cm2 over the entire perimeter of the evaporator. The heat pipe as designed
has a 5.04 MW-in (12.8 MW-cm) figure of merit based on total pipe length which compares
to a 1.3 MW-in (3.3 MW-
cm) for the current state-of-the-art monogroove heat pipe.
The efforts will focus on developing full scale prototype heat pipes for ground testing
and space flight testing. The work will include fabricating and testing pre-prototype
heat pipes for the purpose of fully characterizing and optimizing their performance
as well as the development of a computer model to aid in predicting and evaluating
the performance of composite heat pipes. The hardware for coupling heat pipe components
having differing cross sections will be developed and the fabrication and testing
of scale prototype composite heat pipe(s) will be conducted.