Friday, 22 November 2013

Air-cooled condenser types


There are two types under this category, viz.
 (a) natural convection and
(b) forced air type.
 
 
Natural Convection Condenser
Air movement over the surface of condenser tubes is by natural convection. As air comes in contact with the warm-condenser tubes, it absorbs heat from the refrigerant and thus the temperature of the air increases. Warm air being lighter, rises up and in its place cooler air from below rises to take away the heat from the condenser. This cycle goes on. Since air moves very slowly by natural convection, the rate of flow of heat from the refrigerant to air will be small. Thus a natural convection condenser is not capable of rejecting heat rapidly. Therefore a relati vely large surface area of the condenser is required. Hence the use of this type of condenser is limited to very small units such as domestic refrigerators. It, however, requires very 45 Refrigeration Equipment little maintenance.
 
In the small units, the condenser is fixed at the rear of the refrigerator cabinets. Generally, steel tubes are used, steel being cheaper than copper. To increase the heat-transfer area, wires are welded to the condenser tubes.These wires provide mechanical strength to the coil as well. In certain designs,widely-spaced fins are used. It is necessary to space the fins quite widely to avoid resistance to free (natural convection) air movement over the condenser. Still another design is the plate-type. The condenser coil is fastened to aplate. The plate being in contact with the condenser tubes, the surface area of the condenser is increased. The plate-type condenser is mounted on the back of the refrigerator cabinet with a small gap between the cabinet and the plate. This gap gives an air-flue effect and facilitates better natural convection air currents.It is obvious that while locating refrigerators or deep-freezes cabinets with a natural convection condenser fixed on the cabinet, sufficient care should be taken to allow free air movement. Also they should not be near an oven or
any warm location.
 
Forced-air Circulation Condenser
 
This type employs a fan or blower to move air over the condenser coil at a certain velocity. The condenser coil is of the finned type. Fins in such coils are closely spaced (ranging between 8 and 17 fins per inch). The space between the fins gets choked with dirt and lint. Therefore to obtain optimum capacity, the fins should be kept clean. For circulating air over the condenser, fans are mounted on the shaft/pulley of the compressor motor. 
 
For bigger-capacity plants a separate motor is used to drive the fan or blower as also for hermetic-compressor units
 
 
 

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