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Airflow study of a spilt-type outdoor unit subjected to near wall effect using Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) simulation
Syed Ahmad Fahmi Syed Ibrahim1, Tong, Douglas Kum Tien2, Mohd Anuar Abd Aziz3, Chin, Wai Meng4.
The efficiency of the split-type air conditioner, which consists of indoor and
outdoor units, is determined by the refrigeration cycle efficiency of its condensation,
compression and evaporation processes. The key factors that affect the performance
of the outdoor unit are the air flow profile and the refrigerant pressure
at the compressor discharge. If the air flow rate decreases, the discharge pressure
of the compressor increases. This will cause the power consumption to increase
and overall efficiency to drop. One of the factors affecting the air flow profile is
the installation distance between the outdoor unit and the wall. The distance of
this wall gap is crucial because it affects the static pressure in the gap. This
static pressure interferes with the air flow towards the outdoor unit. Therefore,
the smaller the gap, the higher the static pressure and hence less air will flow
through the outdoor unit. The purpose of this research is to study the air flow of a splittype
outdoor air conditioner unit when it is placed near the wall and investigate its
optimum placement from the wall. For the first stage of this investigation, the 3D
CAD modelling of the DAIKIN outdoor unit of 5SL15F SERIES was completed
using ANSYS SPACECLAIM software. The meshing was done using
SnappyHexMesh code. Next, the simulation was conducted using OPENFOAM
software to determine the air flow profile. The air flow profile was then inputted into
the CoilDesigner software. Then, the CoilDesigner software was used to create the
heat exchanger condition for the condenser and evaporator prior to transferring this
condition into the VapCyc software. The VapCyc software is a refrigerant cycle
programme and it was used to predict the discharge pressure at the compressor based
on the obtained air flow profile. The input for the VapCyc software comprises of the
specifications of the four air conditioner components, namely the condenser,
evaporator, expansion device and compressor. The results show that optimum
distance is at 200 mm for both x-axis and y-axis directions with 1000 mm for the zaxis.
It has the highest airflow rate and lowest discharge pressure at the compressor.
Affiliation:
- Taylor's University, Malaysia
- Taylor's University, Malaysia
- Daikin Research & Development Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Malaysia
- Daikin Research & Development Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Malaysia
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Indexation |
Indexed by |
MyJurnal (2019) |
H-Index
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0 |
Immediacy Index
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0.000 |
Rank |
0 |
Indexed by |
Scopus (SCImago Journal Rankings 2016) |
Impact Factor
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- |
Rank |
Q3 (Engineering (miscellaneous)) |
Additional Information |
0.193 (SJR) |
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