Numerical study on thermoelectric-hydraulic performance of thermoelectric recuperator with wavy thermoelectric fins.

A thermoelectric-hydraulic numerical model is built for thermoelectric recuperators with wavy and straight fins under large longitudinal temperature difference. and their perforinance is analyzed. It is ft,und that thecomprehensiveperformanceof the wavy-fin thermoelectric recuperator is hetter than that of straight-fin thernioelectric recuperator. The maximuni output powers of the two thermoelectric recuperators are 0.251 mW and 0.236 mW at inlet velocity 01' 1.7 m· M-'. When theratiool wave height to wave length is (). 1, the maximum output power is 0.25 I mW and output power per unit volume is 414.8 W · In--i. Taguchi method is used to optimize the wavy-lin thermoclectric recuperator. It is found that reducing channel width and plate thickness is beneficial to increase the output power and output power per unit volume for the wavy-fin thermoelectric recuperator. Increasing fin height and fin thickness is beneficial to the output power, but disadvantage to the output power per unit volume. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]