Basic Parts Of A Refrigeration System And Its Processes
Introduction
Refrigeration is a branch of science that deals with the process of cooling of space or substance below the environmental temperature. So to make things simple Refrigeration is a process of taking out the heat inside a closed system and that makes it cooler than the outside environment. I want to share with you my knowledge about this field since I am an engineering student and it has been taught on us a year ago.
The simplest principle behind this process is When liquid evaporates it absorbs heat, when liquid condenses it releases heat.
An example is when you have water in your hand you just feel cold and that is the process of the water evaporating and cooling your hand, another is when you hold a cold beer on a hot day, your beer will have water condensing on the outside of the bottle and this warms your beer.
Before we go on the processes, you must first know the parts.
##Basic Parts Of A Refrigeration System
Refrigerant
A refrigerant or a cooling agent is a substance or mixture, usually a fluid, used in a heat pump and refrigeration cycle. In most cycles it undergoes phase transitions from a liquid to a gas and back again.
Expansion Valve
An expansion valve is a device which reduce the pressure of the liquid refrigerant and it also regulates the flow of the refrigerant to the evaporator, In this photo the expansion device is a capillary tube.
Evaporator
An evaporator is a heat exchanger which transfers heat from the substance being cooled to a boiling refrigerant. The purpose `of the refrigeration system is to remove heat from air, water and other substance. This removal is performed by the evaporator.
Compressor
The compressor is the heart of the refrigeration system. It compresses the refrigerant. The compressor receives low pressure gas from the evaporator and converts it to high pressure gas. As the gas is compressed, the temperature rises.
Condenser
The condenser receives super heated refrigerant and remove it then liquefy the refrigerant. It is the ultimate point of heat rejection from the refrigeration system.
How it works
The refrigerant or the cooling agent is a liquid that enters the expansion device. As it passes through, the sudden drop of pressure makes it expands, cool and turns it into a gas state. As the refrigerant flows around the evaporator coil it absorbs and removes heat from the things inside the closed space. The compressor squeezes the refrigerant raising its temperature and pressure, it is now hot and high pressured gas. The refrigerant then flows through condenser coils at the back of the refrigerator radiating its heat to the atmosphere and then cooling back into a liquid state, the refrigerant then re-enters the capillary tube or the expansion device and the cycle goes over and over again. So basically heat is taken from the inside and is thrown outside the refrigerated space.
If you happen to reach until the end of this blog, I sincerely thank you for sharing your time on reading. If you have some concerns and thoughts about this please do not hesitate to leave a comment and I will surely be glad to respond :)
Photos are all mine except for the refrigerant since it is already inside the system when i took all those pictures.
Credits 1
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