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A heat pipe or heat pin is a heat-transfer device that combines the principles of both thermal
conductivity and phase transition to efficiently manage the transfer of heat between two solid interfaces.
Heat pipes are one of the most effective procedures to transport thermal energy from one point to another,
mostly used for cooling. It is based on a combination of conduction and convective heat transfer, what
makes it to a complex heat transfer problem.
At the hot interface within a heat pipe, which is typically at a very low pressure, a liquid in contact with a
thermally conductive solid surface turns into a vapor by absorbing heat from that surface. The vapor
condenses back into a liquid at the cold interface, releasing the latent heat. The liquid then returns to the
hot interface through either capillary action or gravity action where it evaporates once more and repeats
the cycle. In addition, the internal pressure of the heat pipe can be set or adjusted to facilitate the phase
change depending on the demands of the working conditions of the thermally managed system.
Structure, design and construction
A typical heat pipe consists of a sealed pipe or tube made of a material with high thermal conductivity
such as copper or aluminium at both hot and cold ends. A vacuum pump is used to remove all air from the
empty heat pipe, and then the pipe is filled with a fraction of a percent by volume of working fluid (or
coolant) chosen to match the operating temperature. Examples of such fluids include water, ethanol,
acetone, sodium, or mercury. Due to the partial vacuum that is near or below the vapor pressure of the
fluid, some of the fluid will be in the liquid phase and some will be in the gas phase. The use of a vacuum
eliminates the need for the working gas to diffuse through any other gas and so the bulk transfer of the
vapor to the cold end of the heat pipe is at the speed of the moving molecules. In this sense, the only
practical limit to the rate of heat transfer is the speed with which the gas can be condensed to a liquid at
the cold end. Inside the pipe's walls; an optional wick structure exerts a capillary pressure on the liquid
phase of the working fluid. This is typically a sintered metal powder or a series of grooves parallel to the
pipe axis, but it may be any material capable of exerting capillary pressure on the condensed liquid to
wick it back to the heated end. The heat pipe may not need a wick structure if gravity or some other
source of acceleration is sufficient to overcome surface tension and cause the condensed liquid to flow
back to the heated end.

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A heat pipe is not a thermo siphon, because there is no siphon. Thermo siphons transfer heat by singlephase convection.
Heat pipes contain no mechanical moving parts and typically require no maintenance, though noncondensing gases (that diffuse through the pipe's walls, result from breakdown of the working fluid, or
exist as impurities in the materials) may eventually reduce the pipe's effectiveness at transferring heat.
This is significant when the working fluid's vapour pressure is low.
The materials chosen depend on the temperature conditions in which the heat pipe must operate, with
coolants ranging from liquid helium for extremely low temperature applications (24 K) to mercury
(523923 K) & sodium (8731473 K) and even indium (20003000 K) for extremely high temperatures.
The vast majority of heat pipes for low temperature applications use some combination of ammonia (213
373 K), alcohol (methanol (283403 K) or ethanol (273403 K)) or water (303473 K) as working fluid.
Since the heat pipe contains a vacuum, the working fluid will boil and hence take up latent heat at well
below its boiling point at atmospheric pressure. Water, for instance, will boil at just above 273 K (0
degrees Celsius) and so can start to effectively transfer latent heat at this low temperature.
The advantage of heat pipes over many other heat-dissipation mechanisms is their great efficiency in
transferring heat. They are a fundamentally better heat conductor than an equivalent cross-section of solid
copper (a heat sink alone, though simpler in design and construction, does not take advantage of the
principle of matter phase transition). Some heat pipes have demonstrated a heat flux of more than 230
MW/m.
Active control of heat flux can be affected by adding a variable volume liquid reservoir to the evaporator
section. Variable conductance heat pipes employ a large reservoir of inert immiscible gas attached to the
condensing section. Varying the gas reservoir pressure changes the volume of gas charged to the
condenser which in turn limits the area available for vapor condensation. Thus a wider range of heat
fluxes and temperature gradients can be accommodated with a single design.
A modified heat pipe with a reservoir having no capillary connection to the heat pipe wick at the
evaporator end can also be used as a thermal diode. This heat pipe will transfer heat in one direction,
acting as an insulator in the other.
Vapor Chamber or Flat heat pipes
Thin planar heat pipes (heat spreaders) have the same primary components as tubular heat pipes. These
components are a hermetically sealed hollow vessel, a working fluid, and a closed-loop capillary
recirculation system.
Compared to a one-dimensional tubular heat pipe, the width of a two-dimensional heat pipe allows an
adequate cross section for heat flow even with a very thin device. These thin planar heat pipes are finding
their way into height sensitive applications, such as notebook computers, and surface mount circuit
board cores. It is possible to produce flat heat pipes as thin as 0.5 mm (thinner than a credit card).
Loop heat pipe
A loop heat pipe (LHP) is a two-phase heat transfer device that uses capillary action to remove heat from
a source and passively move it to a condenser or radiator. LHPs are similar to heat pipes but have the
advantage of being able to provide reliable operation over long distance and the ability to operate against
gravity. They can transport a large heat load over a long distance with a small temperature difference

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TEMA:-The TEMA standards specify the manufacturing tolerances for various mechanical classes, the
range of tube sizes and pitches, baffling and support plates, pressure classification, tube sheet thickness
formulas.
The Tubular Exchanger Manufacturers Association (TEMA). The exchangers are built in accordance with
three mechanical standards that specify design, fabrication, and materials of unfired shell-and-tube heat
exchangers. Class R is for the generally severe requirements of petroleum and related processing
applications.Class C is for generally moderate requirements for commercial and general process
applications. Class B is for chemical process service. The exchangers are built to comply with the
applicable ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code, Section VIII (1998), and other pertinent codes and/or
standards. The TEMA standards supplement and define the ASME code for heat exchanger applications.
In addition, state and local codes applicable to the plant location must also be met.
A heat exchanger is a device that is used to transfer thermal energy (enthalpy) between two or more
fluids, between a solid surface and a fluid, or between solid particulates and a fluid, at different
temperatures and in thermal contact. In heat exchangers, there are usually no external heat and work
interactions. Typical applications involve heating or cooling of a fluid stream of concern and evaporation
or condensation of single- or multi component fluid streams. In other applications, the objective may be
to recover or reject heat, or sterilize, pasteurize, fractionate, distill, concentrate, crystallize, or control
a process fluid. In a few heat exchangers, the fluids exchanging heat are in direct contact. In most heat
exchangers, heat transfer between fluids takes place through a separating wall or into and out of a wall in
a transient manner. In many heat exchangers, the fluids are separated by a heat transfer surface, and
ideally they do not mix or leak. Such exchangers are referred to as direct transfer type, or simply
recuperators.
Direct-Transfer Type Exchangers:- In this type, heat transfers continuously from the hot fluid to the
cold fluid through a dividing wall. Although a simultaneous flow of two (or more) fluids is required in the
exchanger, there is no direct mixing of the two (or more) fluids because each fluid flows in separate fluid
passages. In general, there are no moving parts in most such heat exchangers. This type of exchanger is
designated as a recuperative heat exchanger or simply as a recuperator. Some examples of direct transfer
type heat exchangers are tubular, plate-type, and extended surface exchangers. Note that the term
recuperator is not commonly used in the process industry for shell and-tube and plate heat exchangers,
although they are also considered as recuperators. Recuperators are further sub classified as prime surface
exchangers and extended-surface exchangers. Prime surface exchangers do not employ fins or extended
surfaces on any fluid side. Plain tubular exchangers, shell-and-tube exchangers with plain tubes, and
plate exchangers are good examples of prime surface exchangers. Recuperators constitute a vast majority
of all heat exchangers.
Exchangers in which there is intermittent heat exchange between the hot and cold fluids-via thermal
energy storage and release through the exchanger surface or matrix are referred to as indirect transfer
type, or simply regenerators. Such exchangers usually have fluid leakage from one fluid stream to the
other, due to pressure differences and matrix rotation/valve switching. Common examples of heat
exchangers are shell-and tube exchangers, automobile radiators, condensers, evaporators, air
preheaters and cooling towers.
Tubular Heat Exchangers:-These exchangers are generally built of circular tubes, although elliptical,
rectangular, or round/flat twisted tubes have also been used in some applications. There is considerable
flexibility in the design because the core geometry can be varied easily by changing the tube diameter,
length, and arrangement. Tubular exchangers can be designed for high pressures relative to the
environment and high-pressure differences between the fluids. Tubular exchangers are used primarily for
liquid-to-liquid and liquid-to-phase change (condensing or evaporating) heat transfer applications. They
are used for gas-to-liquid and gas-to-gas heat transfer applications primarily when the operating
temperature and/or pressure is very high or fouling is a severe problem on at least one fluid side and no

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other types of exchangers would work. These exchangers may be classified as shell-and tube, doublepipe, and spiral tube exchangers. They are all prime surface exchangers except for exchangers having fins
outside/inside tubes.
Tubular exchangers are widely used in industry for the following reasons. They are custom designed for
virtually any capacity and operating conditions, such as from high vacuum to ultrahigh pressure [over 100
MPa (15,000 psig)], from cryogenics to high temperatures [about 11008C (20008F)] and any temperature
and pressure differences between the fluids, limited only by the materials of construction. They can be
designed for special operating conditions: vibration, heavy fouling, highly viscous fluids, erosion,
corrosion, toxicity, radioactivity, multi component mixtures, and so on. They are the most versatile
exchangers, made from a variety of metal and nonmetal materials (such as graphite, glass, and Teflon) and
range in size from small [0.1m2 (1 ft2)] to supergiant [over 105m2 (106 ft2)] surface area. They are used
extensively as process heat exchangers in the petroleum-refining and chemical industries; as steam
generators, condensers, boiler feed water heaters and oil coolers in power plants; as condensers and
evaporators in some air-conditioning and refrigeration applications; in waste heat recovery applications
with heat recovery from liquids and condensing fluids; and in environmental control.

TYPES OF HEAT EXCHANGER

A regenerative heat exchanger, or more commonly a regenerator, is a type of heat exchanger where the
flow through the heat exchanger is cyclical and periodically changes direction. It is similar to a
countercurrent heat exchanger. However, a regenerator mixes the two fluid flows while a countercurrent
exchanger maintains them separated. The temperature profile remains at a nearly constant temperature,
and this includes the fluid entering and exiting each end.
In regenerative heat exchangers, the fluid on either side of the heat exchanger is nearly always the same
fluid. The fluid is cycled through the heat exchanger, often reaching high temperatures. The fluid may go
through an external processing step, and then it is flowed back through the heat exchanger in the opposite
direction for further processing. Usually the application will use this process cyclically or repetitively.
Thus, in regenerative heat exchangers, a fluid incoming to a process is heated using the energy contained
in the fluid exiting this process.
The regenerative heat exchanger gives a considerable net savings in energy, since most of the heat energy
is reclaimed nearly in a thermodynamically reversible way. This type of heat exchanger can have a
thermal efficiency of over 90%, transferring almost all the relative heat energy from one flow direction to
the other. Only a small amount of extra heat energy needs to be added at the hot end, and dissipated at the
cold end, even to maintain very high or very low temperatures.
Advantages of regenerators
The advantages of a regenerator over a recuperating (counter-flowing) heat exchanger is that it has a
much higher surface area for a given volume, which provides a reduced exchanger volume for a given
energy density, effectiveness and pressure drop. This makes a regenerator more economical in terms of
materials and manufacturing, compared to an equivalent recuperator.
The design of inlet and outlet headers used to distribute hot and cold fluids in the matrix is much simpler
in counter flow regenerators than recuperators. The reason behind this is that both streams flow in
different sections for a rotary regenerator and one fluid enters and leaves one matrix at a time in a fixedmatrix regenerator. Furthermore flow sectors for hot and cold fluids in rotary regenerators can be
designed to optimize pressure drop in the fluids. The matrix surfaces of regenerators also have self-

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cleaning characteristics, reducing fluid-side fouling and corrosion. Finally properties such as small
surface density and counter-flow arrangement of regenerators make it ideal for gas-gas heat exchange
applications requiring effectiveness exceeding 85%. The heat transfer coefficient is much lower for gases
than for liquids, thus the enormous surface area in a regenerator greatly increases heat transfer.
Disadvantages of regenerators
The major disadvantage of a regenerator is that there is always some mixing of the fluid streams, and they
cannot be completely separated.[citation needed] There is an unavoidable carryover of a small fraction of
one fluid stream into the other. In the rotary regenerator, the carryover fluid is trapped inside the radial
seal and in the matrix, and in a fixed-matrix regenerator; the carryover fluid is the fluid that remains in the
void volume of the matrix. This small fraction will mix with the other stream in the following half-cycle.
Therefore regenerators are only used when it is acceptable for the two fluid streams to be mixed. Mixed
flow is common for gas-to-gas heat and/or energy transfer applications and less common in liquid or
phase-changing fluids since fluid contamination is often prohibited with liquid flows.