Operating characteristics of 3RT heat pumps

Newly designed vapor-injection heat pumps have been proposed and analyzed in the present study. An economizer-type vapor-injection (V-I) system has been employed as the standard system because of its reliability and simple control method. The V-I system has a re-cooler and re-heater for cooling and heating, respectively. Solar panels have been installed in the V-I heat pump as well as in the re-heater in order to enhance heating capacity and performance. R410A has been employed as a working fluid and performance analysis has been conducted under various conditions. Results are summarized as follows: (1) The V-I system with the re-cooler yielded a marginally higher coefficient of performance (COP) than the conventional V-I refrigeration system. (2) By increasing the re-cooler cooling capacity, enhanced system performance as compared to the conventional V-I system was observed. (3) The re-heater negatively affected the system performance; hence, the V-I heat pump with the re-heater yielded a lower COP than that of the conventional V-I heat pump used for heating. (4) Although the solar panels increased the system performance, this increase could not offset performance degradation by the re-heater.