IMPROVEMENT IN COOLING SYSTEM FOR VEHICLE MOUNTED AND PORTABLE LOCATOR FOR GREATER OPERATIONAL EFFICIENCY

Abstract

The device under consideration is a portable locator installed on the backside of a pick-up truck. It has 13 heat generating sources, 5 parallel plate fin heatsinks and 5 fans. The material used for the device is Aluminum 6061-T6. It has a working temperature of 58.51˚C which is very close to the safe working temperature (60˚C) and it has a total power of 796.4 W. The ambient temperature is taken as 50˚C. This project is divided into various parts. In the first part, the original design is analyzed for maximum temperature (58.51˚C). In the second part, heat sink selection is carried out. The fins considered are plate fins, cross-cut extrusion fins and cylindrical pin fins (linear, staggered). In the third part, optimization of fins is carried out for geometric parameters such as number of fins, thickness of fins and spacing between the fins. In the fourth part, material is replaced with Aluminum Graphite and optimization is performed in the volume fraction of 10-90 %. In the final part, air ducting is used to enhance the thermal performance of fins. The simulations are carried out for both inlet and exhaust fans. Ansys Icepak software is used for designing and simulation purposes with SST k-omega turbulence model. Optimized parallel plate fin heat sink is selected with air ducting for the final design. The working temperature of final design is 51.93˚C which is 8.07˚C safe from the safe working temperature and has a difference of 6.58˚C from the original design temperature.