Operation characteristics of cylindrical miniature grooved heat pipe using aqueous CuO nanofluids

An experimental study was performed to investigate the operation characteristics of a cylindrical miniature grooved heat pipe using aqueous CuO nanofluid as the working fluid at some steady cooling conditions. The experiments were carried out under both the steady operation process and the unsteady startup process. The experiment results show that substituting the nanofluid for water as the working fluid can apparently improve the thermal performance of the heat pipe for steady operation. The total heat resistance and the maximum heat removal capacity of the heat pipe using nanofluids can maximally reduce by 50% and increase by 40% compared with that of the heat pipe using water, respectively. For unsteady startup process, substituting the nanofluid for water as the working fluid, cannot only improve the thermal performance, but also reduce significantly the startup time. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.