Augmented cooling vest system subassembly: Design and analysis

• Thermoelectric cooler (TEC) was employed to provide cooling air to cooling vest.
• Aluminum cooling fins were used to exchange heat for hot and cold sides of TEC.
• Performance of the system was determined and the experimental technique was described.
• Heat sink is capable to remove additional heat and heat exchanger provides cooling air.
• Future work is proposed to optimize the efficiency of the system.

A prototype cooling engine consisting of thermoelectric coolers (TECs) was developed and designed. In this prototype, aluminum cooling fins were employed as the heat exchange method for both the hot and cold sides of the TEC. Aluminum fins were used to cool the ambient air through a heat exchanger and dissipate heat build up from the heat sink. This system was modeled and performance capabilities were determined. The experimental technique used to monitor parameters affecting the efficiency of the designed system was described. These parameters include the temperatures of the inlets and outlets of both heat exchanger and heat sink and the flow rate of the cooled air. The experiment was run under three input DC powers; 15 V, 18 V, and 21 V. As the power increased, both the flow rate and the temperature difference between the hot and cold side of thermoelectric cooler increased, demonstrating the heat sink capability to remove the additional heat. However, the temperature difference between the inlet and outlet of the heat exchanger decreases as the power increase. The findings demonstrated the effectiveness of this cooling system and future work is proposed to optimize the heat.