An experimental evaluation of a residential-sized evaporatively cooled condenser

In this paper, the performance of an innovative evaporatively cooled condenser is compared with that of a conventional air-cooled condenser for a split heat pump system. The system was tested in an environmentally controlled test chamber that was able to simulate test conditions as specified by ASHRAE Standard 116. Tests to optimize refrigerant charge and short tube restrictor size were conducted using refrigerant HCFC-22. The wheel rotation speed of the evaporative condenser was also optimized experimentally to maximize the coefficient of performance. Using these optimum parameters, steady state and cyclic performance tests were conducted. The experimental results showed that the evaporative condenser has a higher capacity than the air-cooled condenser by 1.8 to 8.1%, a higher COP by 11.1 to 21.6%, and a higher SEER by 14.5%.