Experimental Study on Indirect Liquid Cooling Performance of Metal 3D-Printed Cold Plates for Battery Thermal Management

Two new cold plates manufactured via metal 3D printing were experimentally investigated for thermal performance analysis in indirect liquid cooling operations; then they were compared to the traditional cold plates. Experiments were performed with different coolant inlet temperatures (15.7 degrees C and 24.5 degrees C) and ambient air velocities (0.5 m/s and 3 m/s) at tropical conditions; hereby, the impact of high dew point temperatures at tropics was also investigated. Body-centered cubic (BCC) and pillar elements were applied in the cooling cavity of the cold plates. The results showed that the target surface temperature in both BCC- and pillar-filled plate designs was maintained below the limits at the lower inlet temperature. However, at the higher inlet temperature, the temperature was only maintained below the limit when the ambient air velocity was 3 m/s. The convective heat transfer coefficient at the inlet temperature of 15.7 degrees C was found 1.5 and 2.5 times higher than the convective heat transfer coefficient value at the inlet temperature of 24.5 degrees C for the pillar- and BCC-filled plates, respectively. The performance evaluation criterion values were found in the range of 1.2 - 2.4, which depended on the operating conditions and were already higher than the referenced studies in the literature.