Experimental study on phase change spray cooling

Phase change spray cooling is known as an effective method to remove heat from high-power electronic devices due to its high heat transfer efficiency and high critical heat flux (CHF). In this study, a closed-cycle spray cooling system with R22 as the coolant was designed and built, and the system cooling performance including the heat transfer coefficient, cooling surface temperature and CHF was experimentally investigated with nozzle inlet pressure in the range of 0.6–1.0 MPa. The system shows a great capability in removing high heat flux from the cooling surface at a relatively low temperature. As the nozzle inlet pressure increases, the value of CHF first increases and then decreases slightly. The maximum CHF of 276.1 W cm−2 is achieved at the nozzle inlet pressure of 0.8 MPa and the corresponding cooling surface temperature is 26.8 °C.

► In this paper, a closed cycle spray cooling system was designed.
► The influence of inlet pressure on spray cooling was analyzed.
► The heat transfer coefficient was studied at different heat fluxes.
► The maximum CHF was 276.1 W cm−2 with cooling surface temperature of 26.78 °C.