Micro-grooved circular miniature heat pipe for thermal management: Experimental and analytical investigations

In this paper, thermal performance of a cylindrical micro-grooved heat pipe is experimentally and mathematically investigated. The experimental tests are conducted included the optimum working fluid filling ratio, heat pipe inclination, and input heat load. The new correlations of micro-grooved heat pipe condensation and evaporation heat transfer coefficients are proposed basing on the experimental data. A coupled thermal and hydraulic model is developed to predict the heat pipe local thermal resistances and operating temperature regarding the effect of the architectural size. The Experimental results show that the heat pipe thermal performance is not affected by the inclination angle. Whereas the heat pipe performance is better at horizontal position. It showed that the micro-grooved heat pipe could provide an efficient performance even if the condenser is longer that 40% of the total length and the heat pipe microgrooves aspect ratio higher than 37%.