Theoretical Analyses and Design of a 4 K Gas-Coupled Multi-Bypass Stirling-Type Pulse Tube Cryocooler

  • LIU Xuming ,
  • YANG Biao ,
  • CHEN Liubiao ,
  • WANG Junjie ,
  • ZHOU Yuan
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  • 1. Chinese Academy of Sciences Key Laboratory of Cryogenics, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Beijing 100190, China
    2. University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China

Online published: 2023-12-04

Supported by

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (Grant No. 2018Y FB0504603), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. U1831203), the Strategic Pilot Projects in Space Science of China (Grant No. XDA15010400), the Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. QYZDY-SSW-JSC028), and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. 2019030).

Copyright

Science Press, Institute of Engineering Thermophysics, CAS and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2022

Abstract

Gas-coupled Stirling-type pulse tube cryocooler (SPTC) is currently the most compact and simplest configuration among all types of cryocoolers, but it is challenging to achieve a very low temperature. This paper investigates a gas-coupled SPTC which is capable of directly achieving a temperature of around 4 K. Theoretical analyses were performed based on SAGE to study the effects of employing one or more multi-bypass structures on apparent cooling performance, and internal working parameters. The simulation results indicate that the function of the multi-bypass is similar to that of a multi-stage gas-coupled structure, producing a pre-cooling effect on the lower-temperature section by increasing the acoustic power and the enthalpy flow in the pulse tube of the higher-temperature section. The cooperation of two multi-bypass structures can promote a higher enhancement of the cooling performance, but it is difficult to achieve the same cooling performance of a completely multi-stage gas-coupled SPTC due to weak phase-shifting capability and excessive reduction of the mass flow. Based on the model, the developed prototype has achieved a no-load temperature of 4.4 K, which shows the great potential of using a gas-coupled SPTC to obtain a cooling temperature below 4 K.

Cite this article

LIU Xuming , YANG Biao , CHEN Liubiao , WANG Junjie , ZHOU Yuan . Theoretical Analyses and Design of a 4 K Gas-Coupled Multi-Bypass Stirling-Type Pulse Tube Cryocooler[J]. Journal of Thermal Science, 2022 , 31(6) : 2077 -2087 . DOI: 10.1007/s11630-022-1684-8

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