Numerical and experimental investigation on flow and heat transfer characteristics of trapezoidal regenerator in Stirling generator

Juhui Yang, Wen Huang, Yu Feng, Zhangtao Jin, Hao Wu and Zhikang Shuai

Energy, 2025, vol. 320, issue C

Abstract: Stirling generator is one of the best choices for achieving sustainable development, which has attracted much attention for its high efficiency, high reliability and fuel adaptability. As the core heat exchange component of Stirling generator, regenerator has great influence on its output power and efficiency. However, there is an inherent contradiction between flow resistance and heat storage capacity in the regenerator. Large flow resistance or insufficient heat storage capacity will lead to deterioration Stirling generator performance. This paper proposes an innovative trapezoidal regenerator structure that trade off flow resistance and heat storage capacity. The trapezoidal regenerator consists of straight channels and corners. Among them, the straight channel has a regular flow space distribution, which reduces the flow resistance. The working gas mixing at the corners forms a vortex, leading to enhanced heat transfer. This structure effectively balances the flow and heat transfer characteristics of regenerator. Through numerical simulation and experiment test, the relationship between Reynolds number with friction coefficient and Nusselt number is measured. The results show that the NPH/NTU of trapezoidal regenerator is only 41 % of woven screen and random fiber, which has the best figure of merit. These studies prove the potential of trapezoidal regenerator in Stirling generator.

Keywords: Stirling generator; Trapezoidal regenerator; Flow resistance; Heat transfer; Performance optimization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544225007583
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:320:y:2025:i:c:s0360544225007583

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2025.135116

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().