Maximum cooling and maximum efficiency of thermoacoustic refrigerators

This work provides valid experimental evidence on the difference between design for maximum cooling and maximum efficiency for thermoacoustic refrigerators. In addition, the influence of the geometry of the honeycomb ceramic stack on the performance of thermoacoustic refrigerators is presented as it affects the cooling power. Sixteen cordierite honeycomb ceramic stacks with square cross sections having four different lengths of 26, 48, 70 and 100 mm are considered. Measurements are taken at six different locations of the stack hot ends from the pressure antinode, namely 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600 mm respectively. Measurement of temperature difference across the stack ends at steady state for different stack geometries are used to compute the cooling load and the coefficient of performance. The results obtained with atmospheric air showed that there is a distinct optimum depending on the design goal.