3 ms·
I wonder how effective the micro-porous aluminum is at transferring heat from a cooling fluid to a heat sink. That might be useful even in active, non-evaporati
by highd 10y ago
I wonder how effective the micro-porous aluminum is at transferring heat from a cooling fluid to a heat sink. That might be useful even in active, non-evaporative cooling systems.
- rosser 10y agoIsn't heat transfer very closely tied to surface area (among other things)?
- highd 10y agoThat's my thinking - so this should have crazy surface area. You could make some really awesome aluminum parts. Create a dense exterior with some interior "strut" infill structure and a very porous fill and put plumbing fixtures on the ends. Super strong, lightweight parts that you can cool at crazy rates. I wonder if this would work for aerospace? IIRC cooling the components exposed to exhaust can be a big limitation.
- gumby 10y agoOh man, keeping the flow laminar over all those transfer surfaces, and of course increasing the work because of the obstructions to flow...so many fun engineering problems!!
- tajen 10y agoExactly, they don't provide measurements and comparisons, for example I'd love to know the temperature spike of the motors when it's cooled and when it's not (e.g. when they have to programmatically stop it because it risks overheating). Active motors still work at ~ 100°℃, can't they?
- gumby 10y agoThere's a lot of (unfortunately) classified knowledge in this area. For example the SR-71 used its fuel as a coolant -- they had a lot of crazy thermal problems (that they worked out on slide rules!)