Experimental investigation on the effect of conical valve shape and swirl generator to the performance of Ranque-Hilsch Vortex Tube

Temperature at cold outlet, cold mass fraction and isentropic efficiency in the Ranque-Hilsch Vortex Tube (RHVT) are experimentally measured and derived. For the experiment, different pressures (absolute) (between 290 to 800 kPa) were applied as source, 3 types of swirl generator and 3 shapes of conical valve were used. The lowest temperature obtained during the experiment was -11.6 for a cold mass fraction (μ_c = 0.947) which gave the highest isentropic efficiency (η_is= 0.336) at source pressure of 790.2 kPa. However, the highest cold mass fraction (μ_c = 1.024) was given by source pressure of 790.2 kPa with isentropic efficiency (η_is) of 0.042 and the cold temperature was 20°C.