Critical equipment plays an essential role in industry because of its lack of redundancy. Failure of critical equipment results in a major economic burden that will affect the profit of the enterprise. Lack of redundancy for critical equipment occurs because of the high cost of the equipment usually combined with its high reliability. When we are analyzing the reliability of such equipment, as a result, there are few opportunities to crash a few pieces of equipment to actually verify component life. Reliability is the probability that an item can perform its intended function for a specified interval of time under stated conditions and achieve low long-term cost of ownership for the system considering cost alternatives. From the economical standpoint, the overriding reliability issue is cost, particularly the cost of unreliability of existing equipment caused by failures. Classical questions about reliability are: · How long will the equipment function before failure occurs? · What are the chances that a failure will occur in a specified interval for turnaround? · What is the best turnaround interval? · What is the inherent reliability of the equipment? · What are the risks of delaying repair/replacements? · What is the cost of unreliability? · … We will try to answer these questions for a critical reciprocating compressor, which has been in service for only 4 years and has undergone only few failures. Professionals in all industries are faced with the problems of performing maintenance actions and optimizing maintenance planning for their repairable systems. Constructing stochastic models of their repairable systems and using these models to optimize maintenance strategies require a basic understanding of several key reliability and maintainability concepts and a mathematical modeling approach. Therefore, our objective is to present fundamental concepts and modeling approaches in the case of a critical reciprocating compressor. We developed a stochastic model not to simulate a reciprocating compressor with a complete set of components but mainly to optimize the overhaul period taking into account the main failure modes only. How to lower the cost? How to reduce or remove maintenance actions that are not strictly necessary? How to improve the long-term profitability of ageing plants with the strict respect of Health-Safety-Environment HSE requirements? A reciprocating compressor is a complex machine that cannot be described with a single reliability function. A compressor has several failure modes. Each failure mode is assumed to have its own Weibull cumulative distribution function. The compressor is then a system with several Weibull laws in series. We will extend the usual procedure for minimizing the expected total cost to a group of components. Different components may have different preventive maintenance “needs”, but optimizing preventive maintenance at the component level may be sub-optimal at the system level. We will study also the reliability importance indices that are valuable in establishing direction and prioritization of actions related to a reliability improvement plan, i.e. which component should be improved to increase the overall lifetime and thus reduce the system costs. When considering a large system with many items that are maintained or replaced preventively, it is advantageous to schedule the preventive maintenance in a block such that the system downtime is kept as small as possible. This requires that the resources are available so that the maintenance of components can be performed simultaneously or according to a well-defined sequence. The result of the stochastic model optimization came as a surprise. We thought to find a new mean-time-between-failure MTBF, larger than the actual overhaul period. Actually, the model showed that there is no economical interest to schedule a systematic preventive maintenance for this reciprocating compressor. Nevertheless, we cannot wait for a failure (and the associated corrective maintenance) because the loss-of-production cost is too high and this compressor has no spare. Preventive maintenance is not the optimum strategy, but predictive maintenance is. But what means predictive maintenance? It is a maintenance policy to regularly inspect equipment to detect incipient changes or deterioration in its mechanical or electrical condition and performance. The idea behind this is to perform corrective maintenance only when needed, before the occurrence of failure. We need to find how to detect performance deterioration of the compressor with a couple of weeks or days notice before failure. So it is possible to schedule a right maintenance activity at the optimum moment. To summarize, the main findings of this thesis are · a new method to estimate the shape factor of a Weibull distribution function, · a stochastic model demonstrating that we have to move from systematic preventive maintenance to predictive maintenance, · a low cost system based on thermodynamic approach to monitor a reciprocating compressor, · an automatic detection of performance deterioration.

The main objective of this study is to propose and to validate simplified models to simulate the performance of refrigeration systems. The proposed modelling approach of the system is modular: the compressor is modelled by a simple and physical model that takes into account the heat transfers and the un-matching of internal and external pressure ratio for the scroll compressors. The evaporator is modelled as a two zones heat exchanger on the refrigeration side (one for the two phases zone and the other one for superheated gas) and finally the condenser is assumed to be divided into three zones (de-superheating, two-phase and the sub-cooling). The compressor model was already developed by other author; here it is only validated using three scroll compressors and two reciprocating ones. The main differences are the conditions at which these compressors are tested: 20 bar at the supply and 40 at the exhaust. The condenser and evaporator models are the main contribution of this study. These models use the geometry and the correlation from the literature to calculate the global heat transfer coefficient on each zone. In the case of the condenser, a mean void fraction model is used to determinate the condenser subcooling as function of the refrigerant charge or vice-versa. The refrigeration system model is validated with experimental results obtained on each component and the whole system in five different test benches. The results show a very good agreement between the measured and predicted main outputs of the system.

This research involves the study of a one- and two-cylinder convertible reciprocating Freon compressor for air conditioning or refrigeration purposes. The main concern is the reduction of the vibration (noise) caused during the operation of the compressor. Vibration is a main concern when the compressor is shifted from the one-cylinder operation to the two-cylinder operation mode and the reverse of this shift. The objectives for this research are (1) to investigate the shaking force due to the reciprocating mass at high frequencies, which are up to 4600 Hz (80w) in this research; (2) to determine the dominant force for compressor vibration among the three possible sources of shaking force due to reciprocating mass, impact forces due to clearance at the connecting rod - piston joint, and the z-axis force from the motor torque due to the rotor's conductor rods being skewed at an angle; (3) to minimize the difference in change of kinetic energies when switching between the one- and two-cylinder operating modes of the compressor. The properties of the vibration in one- and two-cylinder operation have been studied and results have been analyzed in terms of kinetic energies generated in different setting of operation of the compressor. Dynamic simulation for the impact force is computed using SIMULINK. The Z-axis force due to the motor is computed. Results indicated that shaking force due to the reciprocating mass is the dominant force for only the first two harmonics (w, 2w). An optimization routine based on Hooke and Jeeves pattern search method is developed and an optimized setting of angle, force, and torque for balancing of the crankshaft to achieve objective (3) is determined. / Master of Science

<div>Vapor compression cycles are the most common method used to provide cooling to environments. In the residential area, refrigerator/freezers as well as air conditioners/heat pumps almost exclusively use vapor compression cycles. The driving force behind a vapor compression cycle is the compressor, where a variety of compressor types are used in the same application. While reciprocating compressors are found in the majority of refrigerator/freezers, scroll compressors are predominantly used in residential air conditioners. Yet other compressors have emerged as replacements due to increased efficiency. A R134a oil-free prototype scroll compressor and a R134a reciprocating compressor are operated in a hot-gas bypass test stand under refrigerator/freezer conditions to compare performance. Additionally, a R407C scroll compressor and a R410A rotary compressor are operated in a compressor calorimeter under air conditioning/heat pump conditions to compare performance. Experimental results show that the reciprocating compressor far outperforms the prototype scroll compressor in the refrigerator/freezer application, while the performance between the scroll and rotary compressors are almost equal in the air conditioning application.</div><div>Pressure fluctuation at compressor discharge is also measured in the compressor calorimeter to determine feasibility of applying a novel muffling design to air conditioning compressors, although it was found that traditional muffling methods currently used are effective to a degree such that this new method is unwarranted. Data from the compressor calorimeter is also used to investigate the accuracy of the AHRI 540 10-Coefficient Correlation compressor map in predicting performance both inside and outside the tested operating conditions. The AHRI 10-Coefficient Correlation achieves high accuracy inside tested operating conditions but is inept in extrapolating performance, where other map correlations are more accurate.</div>

Critical equipment plays an essential role in industry because of its lack of redundancy. Failure of critical equipment results in a major economic burden that will affect the profit of the enterprise. Lack of redundancy for critical equipment occurs because of the high cost of the equipment usually combined with its high reliability. <p><p>When we are analyzing the reliability of such equipment, as a result, there are few opportunities to crash a few pieces of equipment to actually verify component life. <p><p>Reliability is the probability that an item can perform its intended function for a specified interval of time under stated conditions and achieve low long-term cost of ownership for the system considering cost alternatives. From the economical standpoint, the overriding reliability issue is cost, particularly the cost of unreliability of existing equipment caused by failures. <p><p>Classical questions about reliability are:<p><p>·\ / Doctorat en sciences appliquées / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Production of steel powder is done by atomization of a molten steel stream. Atomization is done by feeding high pressure nitrogen gas through nozzles, creating jets of gas which scatter the molten steel stream into powder. The steel powder falls through the atomization tower whilst it cools and solidifies. Finally, the steel powder is transported for further processing. The compressor is used for two main purposes, to compress the nitrogen gas to desired pressure and enable recycling of nitrogen gas. As nitrogen is inert and do not react with its surrounding, the gas can be recycled. Filtering nitrogen gas from the atomization process, one is able to reuse the gas, which is led to the inlet side of a compressor. A closed loop is thus created which is economically important. In 2021 a major compressor failure occurred, which caused large production losses. iba systems is a commercially available product extensively utilized in the Swedish steel industry for data acquisition, production monitoring and generating key performance indicators. Therefore, this thesis investigates what modules and functionality iba systems have to offer. Process and machine signals are studied to assess both their utility in predicting machine failure and relevant iba modules for the predictive maintenance purposes, based on a literature review. This thesis shows the possibility to implement an anomaly detection to detect abnormal behavior, related to historic compressor failure. Estimating when maintenance is needed is possible but requires implementation of new sensors to obtain useful information, mainly vibration data from machinery. Anomaly detection is implemented using ibaAnalyzer. Additional analysis is done in Matlab.

A performance comparison of heat pumps using a scroll (Sanden) and a reciprocating (Bitzer) compressor was conducted experimentally. The refrigerant used was R600a (isobutane). The heat pump components were evaluated performance-wise through: volumetric and isentropic efficiency of the compressors; the UA-value of the condensers and evaporators; sensible enthalpy differences between the liquid and the suction line in the internal heat exchanger; and overall heat pump system comparison as the coefficient of performance. The Bitzer heat pump had existing measuring devices and equipment installed, and it was already filled with refrigerant. The Sanden heat pump required installation of equipment and measuring devices and a refrigerant refill. The refrigerant charge was decided according to the criteria of the lowest compressor speed, which had an effect of overcharge for higher speeds. The measurements included the temperature of water and refrigerant, pressure of the refrigerant, water volume flow, and compressor power. The heat pumps performances were then evaluated based on these parameters. The Sanden compressor showed higher volumetric efficiency than the Bitzer compressor, for the two lower (out of three) speeds of the compressor. The isentropic efficiency of the Bitzer compressor proved to be higher for all pressure ratios out of the three speeds respectively. The condenser in the Bitzer heat pump showed proper UA-values based on the temperature differences between refrigerant and heat sink. The UA-values of the Sanden heat pump condenser did not increase with compressor speed which then gave a larger temperature difference between refrigerant and heat sink, for the two higher compressor speeds. The evaporators had a similar issue with the temperature difference between refrigerant and heat source, which also showed on the UA-values. The internal heat exchanger in the Bitzer heat pump had a larger sensible enthalpy difference on the suction side compared to the liquid side, when condenser subcooling was low, indicating that some fraction of refrigerant was being condensed instead. The Sanden heat pump instead had higher condenser subcooling and the sensible enthalpy difference showed to be very low in the internal heat exchanger. Finally, the coefficient of performance showed to be slightly higher in the Bitzer heat pump for almost all evaluated condensation and evaporation temperatures. / En jämförelse av prestandan för två värmepumpar, en med scroll- (Sanden) och en med kolvkompressor (Bitzer) har gjorts. Köldmedlet som användes var R600a (isobutan). Komponenterna och hur deras prestanda blev utvärderad följer här: kompressorernas volymetriska och isentropisk verkningsgrad; kondensorns och förångarens UA-värden; den sensibla entalpiskillnaden mellan gas- och vätskeledning i den interna värmeväxlaren; en övergripande jämförelse av värmepumparna i form av deras värmefaktor. Värmepumpen med Bitzerkompressor utvärderades med befintliga komponenter och mätutrustning, och en redan fylld mängd köldmedium. Värmepumpen med Sandenkompressor installerades med mätutrustning och komponenter, och fylldes med köldmedium. Mängden köldmedium bestämdes utifrån kriterier för det lägsta varvtalet på kompressorn, vilket visade sig ge en för stor mängd köldmedium vid de högre varvtalen. Mätningarna inkluderade temperatur på vatten och köldmedium, köldmediets tryck, vattnets volymflöde samt kompressorns effektbehov. Prestandan för värmepumparna är sedan utvärderad utifrån dessa data. Sandenkompressorn visade en högre volymetrisk verkningsgrad för de två lägre (av tre) hastigheterna utvärderade i experimenten, jämfört med Bitzer. Den isentropiska verkningsgraden var högre i Bitzerkompressorn för samtliga tryckförhållanden för de tre respektive hastigheterna. Kondensorn i Bitzervärmepumpen uppvisade goda UA-värden, baserat på temperaturskillnaderna mellan köldmedium och värmesänka. Kondensorn i Sandenvärmepumpen visade ingen förbättring av UA-värden när kompressorns hastighet ökade, vilket i sin tur gav upphov till stora temperaturskillnader mellan köldmediet och värmesänkan. Förångarna i båda värmepumparna uppvisade liknande problem med höga temperaturskillnader mellan värmekälla och köldmedium, vilket även deras UA-värden visade. Den interna värmeväxlaren i Bitzervärmepumpen visade större skillnad i den sensibla entalpin på sug- jämfört med vätskesidan, när underkylningen i kondensorn var låg, vilket indikerade på att en del av köldmediet istället kondenserade. I Sandenvärmepumpen var kondensorns underkylning högre vilket då uppvisade en liten skillnad i den sensibla entalpin mellan de båda sidorna. Slutligen så visade Bitzervärmepumpen en något högre värmefaktor än Sandenvärmepumpen för nästan alla utvärderade kondenserings- och förångningstemperaturer.

<p dir="ltr">Domestic refrigerator/freezers account for 6% of all energy consumption around the globe and mainly rely on vapor compression cycles to operate. Researchers have investigated advanced cycle architectures, such as dual-loop cycles and ejector-enhanced cycles to improve their efficiencies. However, the energy saving potential of these advanced cycles often do not justify the additional costs. To further improve efficiency and reduce energy consumption, this work presents and assesses a two-stage vapor-injected cycle for domestic refrigerator/freezer applications. The proposed cycle directs the refrigerant exiting the medium temperature evaporator directly into the injection port of a vapor-injection compressor. The cycle establishes two separate evaporation temperatures to better match the cabinet temperatures of fresh food and freezer compartments. The reduced difference between each cabinet temperature and its evaporation temperature can reduce heat transfer irreversibilities and improve overall system efficiency. A bypass circuit cycle triple-evaporator domestic refrigerator freezer was used as the baseline cycle to investigate the performance improvement of the proposed cycle. A previously validated dynamic model of the baseline cycle was modified to consider a two-stage vapor-injected cycle. The simulation predicted a 12.9% energy consumption reduction with the proposed cycle when utilizing the baseline compressor efficiency for the vapor-injected compressor.</p><p dir="ltr">To evaluate additional performance improvements, a detailed mechanistic compressor model of the baseline variable-speed compressor was developed and validated with experimental data. Next, a vapor-injection line was added to the compressor model as an additional flow path to the compression chamber. The injection line is modeled as a tube connected to an opening on the cylinder wall, which is uncovered during the compression stroke. The injection tube is controlled by a fast-acting solenoid valve to separate injection and suction flow for the compressor. Parametric studies were carried out to assess the effects of injection timing and injection port diameter on power consumption and overall isentropic efficiency with respect to the baseline compressor. It was found that vapor injection in the reciprocating compressor can reduce the specific work required by more than 10%. Based on parametric studies, opening time of the fast-acting solenoid valve directly impacts the compressor efficiency and mass flow rate. There exists an optimal cylinder pressure associated with the opening of the solenoid valve that leads to maximum compressor efficiency.</p><p dir="ltr">The mechanistic compressor model was integrated into the two-stage system model using a reduced-order model to obtain more realistic and higher fidelity results. The reduced-order model considers the injection thermodynamic state and timing as well as evaporating and condensing temperatures from the system operation. Further, a control scheme based on the two-stage vapor-injected cycle’s available control variables was developed. The vapor-injected reciprocating compressor’s injection timing was varied in a parametric study to study its effect on two-stage system’s performance. As a results, 29.7% energy consumption reduction compared to the baseline cycle was achieved at injection timing of 4.95 radians.</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr">To confirm the design and realistic performance of the designed vapor-injected reciprocating compressor, a prototype was designed and tested. A fast-acting solenoid and in-line check valve are connected and mounted directly on the cylinder wall to reduce dead volume during compression. The solenoid valve is controlled using the crank angle measurement from a Hall-effect sensor detecting a series of specifically placed magnets on the crankshaft. The prototype compressor was tested using a hot-gas-bypass compressor test stand under different suction, discharge and injection pressures. The experimental results show the prototype compressor’s specific work was reduced by up to 25% during vapor-injected operation compared to its single-stage operation with no injection. The results also showed the specific work reduction increased with an increase of injection pressure when condensing and suction pressures were fixed. The experiments also confirmed the compressor is able to separate the suction and injection flow, confirming it’s ability to be used in the two-stage cycle.</p>

This dissertation deals with design of self adjustable discharge valve used in Emerson reciprocating compressors. This work contains research of current state of knowledge, technical analysis of the valve and calculations of basis parameters. Constructional proposal is then presented. Part of the dissertation is manufacturing of prototype and its test. Finally, conclusions for further development are made.

V posledních několika desetiletích se objevuje snaha o snížení firemních nákladů, stejně tak jako nákladů, které je nucen vynaložit zákazník, čímž se společnosti snaží získat výhodu vůči svým konkurentům na trhu. Spolu s tímto trendem jde i neustálá snaha snížit dopady na životní prostředí. Vývoj stávajících produktů se proto zdá být klíčovým prvkem. Tento dokument se zabývá vývojem pístového kompresoru na CO2 chladivo, který vyrábí společnost Emerson Climate Technologies. Cíl práce je zvýšit COP kompresoru při zachování stávající životnosti kompresoru. Diplomová práce je rozčleněna do několika kapitol, které se zabývají analýzou originálního designu kompresoru, návrhem a vyhodnocením designů nových. Nezbytné teoretické základy mohou být také shlédnuty v počátečních kapitolách. V poslední části dokumentu jsou sdělena možná další vylepšení a případné jiné konstrukce. Vývoj byl zaměřen na sestavu ventilové desky. Na základě několika předpokladů a výsledků analýzy původního designu kompresoru byly navrženy nové konstrukce, které byly dále testovány statickou strukturální analýzou. Pomoci modální analýzy byly také vypočteny vlastní frekvence a vlastní tvary sacího jazýčku. Mimo modální a statické strukturální analýzy byla provedena také CFD analýza. V posledním kroku byly testovány navržené prototypy a jejich výsledky byly porovnány s původním kompresorem. K správnému návrhu bylo zapotřebí programové podpory a to především v podobě MATLABu, ANSYSu WB a Microsoft Excelu. V práci jsou velmi často prezentovány obzvláště výsledky získané v programu ANSYS WB.