Water Cooling Effects On Thermoelectric Refrigerators

With the development of science and technology, the improvement ofrefrigeration and freezing is required. The semiconductor refrigerator is widely usedfor its small size, easy installation, green, etc. However, air-cooled semiconductorrefrigerator is generally used with refrigerated food not frozen-food. This paper triesto refit the original semiconductor refrigerator in order to improve the efficiency. Theperformance of thermoelectric refrigerators based on water-cooling method for heatemission is studied both experimentally and theoretically. Our work is summarized asfollows.The basic principle of semiconductor refrigeration and semiconductorrefrigerator operating principle are theoretically researched and different heatemission method is comparatively analyzed which provides a theoretical basis forimprovement of water-cooled refrigerators. Then the working principle of the originalair-cooled semiconductor refrigerator is analyzed and the method of installation ofwater-cooled semiconductor refrigerator is designed based on the original air-cooledsemiconductor refrigerator and the working principle of water-cooling method forheat emission is described in detail.The performance of the improved single-chip water-cooled semiconductorrefrigerator and the improved double-chip water-cooled semiconductor refrigeratorare tested compared with the original air-cooled semiconductor refrigerator. Theresults show that the double-chip water-cooled semiconductor refrigerator can meetour need with best performance. The performance of the double-chip water-cooledsemiconductor refrigerator under three conditions including: the recycled watercooling, the recycled cooling with water at constant temperature and the recycled saltsolution. The experiment results show that the heat emission performance of saltsolution is better than water’s and the cooling effect of semiconductor refrigerator issignificantly improved with water at constant temperature compared with recycledwater cooling. The cooling effect of the small thermoelectric refrigerator stronglydepends on the temperature of the cooling water. The lower the temperature of thecooling water, the lower the cooling temperature is in the end. And a simplifiedsemiconductor refrigerator with aluminum pipes is designed for saving space andmore fresh food. A theoretical model for water-cooled refrigerators was established, allowing thecalculation of the temperature change on the cold side of the semiconductor coolingchip to be possible. The outcome of the theoretical model agrees well with theexperiment results. Our study provides a basis for the performance improvement ofthermoelectric refrigerators by using water cooling.