Numerical analysis of melting process in a water tank for fuel-cell vehicles

연료전지 자동차의 물탱크 해빙과정에 대한 수치해석적 연구

  • Kim, Hark-Koo (Graduate school. Sogang University) ;
  • Jeong, Si-Young (Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sogang University) ;
  • Hur, Nahm-Keon (Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sogang University) ;
  • Lim, Tae-Won (Corporate Research & Development Division, Hyundai-Kia Motors) ;
  • Park, Yong-Sun (Corporate Research & Development Division, Hyundai-Kia Motors)
  • 김학구 (서강대학교 대학원) ;
  • 정시영 (서강대학교 기계공학과) ;
  • 허남건 (서강대학교 기계공학과) ;
  • 임태원 (현대자동차 연료전지자동차 개발팀) ;
  • 박용선 (현대자동차 연료전지자동차 개발팀)
  • Published : 2006.06.21

Abstract

Good cold start characteristics are essential for satisfactory operation of fuel cell vehicles. In this study, the melting process has been numerically investigated for a water tank frozen in cold weather The 2-D model of the tank containing ice and plate heaters was assumed and the unsteady melting process of the ice was calculated. The enthalpy method was used for the description of the melting process, and a FVM code was used to solve the problem. The feasibility study compared with other experiment showed that the developed program was able to describe the melting process well. From the numerical analysis carried out for different wall temperatures of the pate heaters, some important design factors could be found such as local overheating and pressurization in the tank.

Keywords