Numerical study on fast filling of 70 MPa type III cylinder for hydrogen vehicle

There will be significant temperature rise within hydrogen vehicle cylinder during the fast filling process. The temperature rise should be controlled under the temperature limit (85 °C) of the structure material (set by ISO/TS 15869), because it may lead to the failure of the structure. In this paper, a 2-dimensional axisymmetric computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model for fast filling of 70 MPa hydrogen vehicle cylinder is presented. The numerical simulations are based on the modified standard k − ɛ turbulence model. In addition, both the equation of state for hydrogen gas and the thermodynamic properties are calculated by National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) database: REFPROP 7.0. The thermodynamic responses of fast filling with different pressure-rise patterns and filling times within type III cylinder have been analyzed in detail.

► A CFD model for predicting filling process of 70 MPa cylinder is presented.
► Filling processes with different pressure-rise patterns are analyzed.
► Remarkable temperature gradient is found in interlaminar area between layers.