Modelling and testing of hybrid channeling plates for thermal management of batteries for electrical vehicles

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Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Insinööritieteiden korkeakoulu | Master's thesis

Date

2017-12-11

Department

Major/Subject

Mechanical Engineering

Mcode

IA3027

Degree programme

Master’s Programme in Mechanical Engineering (MEC)

Language

en

Pages

47+1

Series

Abstract

In this work, Base Cooling Plates (BCP) used in thermal management of batteries for Electric Vehicle (EV) are designed taking advantage of the new advanced production technique: The Hybrid Friction Stir Channeling (HFSC). The HFSC is a new friction stir based solution for producing internal, closed channels created simultaneously during welding of multiple metal plates. The channels are produced in a single step, with any path and constant or continuously modified shape along the path. In this work, the HFSC was applied to produce BCP made of a skin of copper with aluminum-channeled ribs. The performance of the HFSC to produce BCP was compared with other channeling methods, such as, milling and conventional Friction Stir Channeling (FSC), applied to monolithic aluminum plates. Commercial Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software: Fluent, was used as the main tool to design and optimize the conformal cooling strategy, for each one of the channeling methods. The CFD model was applied in the design of the Base Cooling Plates with simulation of the heat and fluid flow. The CFD simulation model was validated using experimental procedures, mainly regarding the influence of the different surface finishing of the channels, in the heat transference models into the wall. Upon validation, the CFD model was used to minimize the cost and time associated with alternative optimization strategies based on experimental testing of different concepts. The performance parameters used as criteria in the development of the best conformal cooling solution was the cost, weight and thermal efficiency, by minimizing the peak temperature and temperature amplitude in the BCP. The HFSC enables to use a thin sheet of copper with superior thermal capabilities as a base plate of the BCP. Using copper along with HFSC, enables higher corrosion resistance, and retaining the mechanical resistance until much higher temperatures, when compared with utilization of monolithic aluminum plate. The thin copper with the stiffness given by the aluminum channeled ribs, opens up the possibility to use lesser amount of material, lowering the weight and cost of the final assembled system. The stationary state results confirmed that the peak temperature in the BCP made with conventional FSC is better than made with milling in about 4 Kelvin. Considering that, the channels have exactly the same path and size, this improvement is resulting from the different surface finishing. The HFSC process provided the superior thermal properties of all the models, while using less amount of materials. Compared with the solution of channels produced by FSC, the peak temperature of the best HFSC cooling plate was about 7 % (or 18 Kelvin) lower. The structural weight and water volume within the HFSC cooling plate was lower in 10% and 11.5%, respectively.

Description

Supervisor

Vilaca, Pedro

Thesis advisor

Karvinen, Heikki

Keywords

hybrid, channeling, electric, cooling, conformal, copper

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Citation