Design of a Novel Heat Exchanger Using in Automobile Exhaust Thermoelectric Generator

The output performance of Automobile Exhaust Thermoelectric Generator(AETEG) is related to the temperature difference and electric connection topology of thermoelectric modules, in order to decrease the ring current among the thermoelectric modules in parallel with different temperature difference and enhance the output performance, a novel heat exchanger using in AETEG is designed in this paper. The interior structure of heat exchanger with fishbone is analyzed, then its surface temperature distribution is simulated with ANSYS software and experimented with thermal imaging instrument. Both of the results show that the surface temperature distribution of the fishbone heat exchanger designed in this paper is more uniform in lateral direction and displays an obvious gradient in fore-and-aft surface, compared with the one of cavity designed before, the novel heat exchanger has overwhelming advantage in the output performance of AETEG, and the method adopted in this paper is feasible and practical.