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Updated: Jul 9, 2025

Experimental Methods for Investigation of Shape Memory Based Elastocaloric Cooling Processes and Model Validation
Published on: May 2, 2016
Continuous and efficient elastocaloric air cooling by coil-bending
Xueshi Li1, Peng Hua2,3, Qingping Sun4,5
1Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.
Abstract:
Elastocaloric cooling has emerged as an eco-friendly technology capable of eliminating greenhouse-gas refrigerants. However, its development is limited by the large driving force and low efficiency in uniaxial loading modes. Here, we present a low-force and energy-efficient elastocaloric air cooling approach based on coil-bending of NiTi ribbons/wires. Our air cooler achieves continuous cold outlet air with a temperature drop of 10.6 K and a specific cooling power of 2.5 W g-1 at a low specific driving force of 26 N g-1. Notably, the cooler shows a system coefficient of performance of 3.7 (ratio of cooling power to rotational mechanical power). These values are realized by the large specific heat transfer area (12.6 cm2 g-1) and the constant cold zone of NiTi wires. Our coil-bending system exhibits a competitive performance among caloric air coolers.
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