• Transactions of Materials Processing
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.36-41
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• 2012

Gas Assisted Injection Molding is a relatively new low-pressure injection molding technique that provides benefits such as reduced part warpage, excellent surface quality without shrink marks, greater design flexibility, etc. In the gas assisted injection molding process, the injected pressurized nitrogen gas flows through designed gas channels and forms hollow sections within the part. However, due to the characteristics of the gas, the design of the gas channels which are the paths for the injected gas is important in order to avoid defects such as gas blowout, fingering, etc. Therefore, in this study, the gas channel design for gas assisted injection molding of exterior display panels was conducted by examining the results of three CAE analyses. The designed gas channel was verified by conducting tryouts using a 450 ton injection molding machine with 3-stage pressure controlled gas kit. In addition, the hollow shapes which were formed by the gas with the installed gas channels were examined by examining the cross sections of the prototypes that were produced. As a result, it was found that exterior display panels can be produced without any defect by applying the gas assisted injection molding technique.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.127-130
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• 2009

The uniform gas distribution between anode channels of the indirect internal reforming type molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC) is crucial design parameter because of the electric performance and the durability problems. A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis is performed to investigate flow characteristics in the anode channels and manifold under different pressure drop and channel temperature conditions. The combined meshes consists of hexadral meshes in the channels and polyhedral meshes in the manifold are adopted and chemical reactions inside the MCFC system are not included because of computational difficulties associated with the size and geometric complexity of the system. Results indicate that the uniformity in flow-rate is in the range of $\pm$ 0.048 % between the anode channels when the pressure drop of anode channel is about 150 Pa. A gas flow-rate uniformity decreases as the pressure drop of anode channels decreases and as the temperature difference between indirect internal reforming (IIR) channels and anode channels increases.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.293-299
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• 2012

The serpentine flow channel is widely used in polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) to prevent flooding phenomena because it effectively removes liquid water in the flow channel. The pressure drop between inlet and outlet increases as compared with straight channels due to minor losses associated with the corners of the turning configurations. This results in a strong pressure gradient between adjacent channels in specific regions, where some amount of reactant gas can be delivered to catalyst layers by convection through a gas diffusion layer (GDL). The enhancement of the convective flow in the GDL, so-called bypass flow, affects fuel cell performance since the bypass flow influences the reactant transport and thus its concentration over the active area. In the present paper, for the bipolar plate design, a simple analytic model has been proposed to predict the bypass flow in the serpentine type flow channels and validated with three-dimensional numerical simulation results.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.373-373
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• 2009

Relative humidity, membrane conductivity and water activity are critical parameters of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFC) for high performance and reliability. These parameters are closely related with temperature. Moreover, the ideal values of these parameters are not always identical along the channels. Therefore, the cooling channel design and its operating condition should be well optimized along the all location of the channels. In the present study, we have performed a numerical investigation on the effects of cooling channels on performance of a PEMFC. Three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations are solved with the energy equation including heat generated by the electrochemical reactions in the fuel cell. The present numerical model includes the gas diffusion layers (GDL) and serpentine channels for both anode and cathode gas flows, as well as cooling channels. To accurately predict the water transport across the membrane, the distribution of water content in the membrane is calculated by solving a nonlinear differential equation with a nonlinear coefficient, i.e., the water diffusivity which is a function of water content as well as temperature. Main emphasis is placed on the heat transfer between the solid bipolar plate and coolant flow. The present results show that local current density is affected by cooling channels due to the change of the oxygen concentration and the membrane conductivity as well as the water content. It is also found that the relative humidity is influenced by the generated water and the gas temperature and thus it affects the distribution of fuel concentration and the conductivity of the membrane, ultimately fuel cell performance. Unit-cell experiments are also carried out to validate the numerical models. The performance curves between the models and experiments show reasonable results.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.288-297
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• 2009

A serpentine channel geometry often used in a fuel cell has a strong pressure gradient between adjacent channels in specific regions. The pressure gradient helps some amount of reactant gas penetrate through a gas diffusion layer(GDL). As a result, the overall serpentine flow structure is slightly different from the intention of a designer. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of serpentine flow structure on current density distribution. By using a commercial code, STAR-CD, a numerical simulation is performed to analyze the fuel cell with high aspect ratio of active area. To increase the accuracy of the numerical simulation, GDL permeabilities are measured with various compressive forces. Three-dimensional flow field and current density distribution are calculated. For the verification of the numerical simulation results, water condensation process in the cathode channel is observed through a transparent bipolar plate. The result of this study shows that the region of relatively low current density corresponds that of dropwise condensation in cathode channels.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06e
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• pp.229-234
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• 2001

An adiabatic counter-current vertical two-phase flow of air and water in narrow rectangular channels with offset strip fm was investigated experimentally. Tests were systematically performed with downward liquid superficial velocities and upward gas velocities covering 0 to 0.06 m/s and 0 to 2.5 m/s ranges, respectively. Two-phase flow regimes were classified by examining the video images of flow patterns in transparent test sections of 760 mm long and 100 mm wide channel with gaps of 3.0 and 5.0 mm. The channel average void fraction was measured by the quick-closing valve method. Unlike the flow regimes in the channels without fin, where bubbly, slug, chum, and annular flow were identified, only bubbly and chum flow regimes were found for the channels with offset strip fin. However the existence of fin in the channels showed negligible effects on the void fraction. Instead counter-current flow limitations were found to happen at lower air superficial velocity once offset strip fin was introduced in narrow rectangular channels.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2000.11b
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• pp.136-141
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• 2000

A study of counter-current two-phase flow in narrow rectangular channels has been performed. Two-phase flow regimes were experimentally studied in 760 mm long and 100 mm wide test sections with 2.0 and 3.0mm gaps. The resulting data have been compared to previous transition models. For the transition from bubbly to slug flow the superficial velocity of gas increased as the gap width increased. The comparison of experimental data to the transition model developed by Taitel and Barnea showed relatively good agreement for the bubbly-to-slug transition in the case of 2mm gap width. For the criteria of Mishima and Ishii to be applicable to the slug-to-churn transition the distribution parameter should be well defined for narrow channels. Even though the gap width of narrow channels increased the superficial gas velocity did not change for the transition form chum to annular flow regime. For the chum-to-annular transition the model of Taitel and Barnea showed discrepancies with experimental data, especially in the channel with larger gap.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.33 no.11
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• pp.834-839
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• 2009

A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis is performed to investigate flow characteristics in the anode channels and manifold of the internal reforming type molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC). Considering the computational difficulties associated with the size and geometric complexity of the MCFC system, the polyhedral meshes that can reduce mesh connectivity problems at the intersection of the channel and the manifold are adopted and chemical reactions inside the MCFC system are not included. Through this study, the gas flow rate uniformity of the anode channels is mainly analyzed to provide basic insights into improved design parameters for anode flow channel design. Results indicate that the uniformity in flow-rate is in the range of ${\pm}$1% between the anode channels. Also, the mal-distributed inlet flow-rate conditions and the change in the size of the manifold depth have no significant effect on the flow-rate uniformity of the anode channels.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2008.11b
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• pp.3120-3124
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• 2008

A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis is performed to investigate flow characteristics in the anode channels and manifold of the internal reforming type molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC). Considering the computational difficulties associated with the size and geometric complexity of the MCFC system, the polyhedral meshes that can reduce mesh connectivity problems at the intersection of the channel and the manifold are adopted and chemical reactions inside the MCFC system are not included. Through this study, the gas flow rate uniformity of the anode channels is mainly analyzed to provide basic insights into improved design parameters for anode flow channel design. Results indicate that the uniformity in flow-rate is in the range of ${\pm}1%$ between the anode channels. Also, the mal-distributed inlet flow-rate conditions and the change in the size of the manifold depth have no significant effect on the flow-rate uniformity of the anode channels.

• Proceedings of the Korean Powder Metallurgy Institute Conference
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• 2006.09a
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• pp.97-98
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• 2006

Gas-permeable metal die materials are developed using tool steel powder, packed in a mold having the insertion of orthogonally arrayed polymer wires. Linear gas-permeable channels in orthogonal array are thus developed by the burning out of the polymer wires, which yield a microstructure with wear resistance value and air permeability much larger than those of the conventional gas-permeable die material.