Thermal-Fluid Performance Prediction of Gyroid Heat Exchanger for Cooling System Applications

The advancement of additive manufacturing has enabled the development of highly energy saving and compact heat exchangers with complex geometries, such as gyroid structures, which exhibit superior thermal-fluid performance. This study proposes a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis of a gyroid-based heat exchanger designed for cooling applications using R290 refrigerant. The gyroid structure, characterized by high surface area density and low friction factor, was evaluated for its heat transfer efficiency and pressure drop characteristics. Numerical simulations were executed to assess the impact of flow velocity, pressure distribution, and temperature gradients on the gyroid heat exchanger’s performance. The coefficient of performance (COP) which indicates of the efficiency of a thermal system without a heat exchanger is 3.22, when using a gyroid heat exchanger for the superheat and subcooling process increases it to 3.29. The results demonstrate that the gyroid heat exchanger enhances convective heat transfer while maintaining relatively low-pressure losses, leading to a 2.2% improvement in the system's COP compared to conventional cooling system design. The findings highlight the potential of gyroid heat exchangers as next-generation compact thermal management solutions, contributing to increased energy efficiency in the industrial cooling applications.