Cooling architecture for liquid hydrogen superconducting system
AssigneeRtx Corporation
InventorAbbas A. Alahyari
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An aircraft propulsion system a cryogenic fuel system, a superconducting electrical device that is operable at a cryogenic temperature, a cooling system where a cooling fuel flow is utilized for maintaining the superconducting electrical device at the cryogenic temperature, an ejector where the primary fuel flow from the fuel system drives the cooling fuel flow through the cooling system to form a combined fuel flow, and a separator where a first portion of the combined fuel flow from the ejector is routed to the core engine and a second portion of the combined fuel flow is routed back to the cooling system.
Claims20
A method of managing thermal conditions of a superconducting electrical device of an aircraft propulsion system comprising:
- driving a cooling fuel flow with a primary fuel flow through an ejector to output a combined fuel flow;
- separating the combined fuel flow including the primary fuel flow and the cooling fuel flow in a separator into a first portion routed to a core engine and a second portion for cooling the superconducting electrical device;
- cooling the second portion of the combined fuel flow to generate the cooling fuel flow in a preliminary heat exchanger with a portion of the primary fuel flow upstream of the ejector;
- and
- transferring thermal energy from the superconducting electrical device into the cooling flow to maintain the superconducting electrical device within a temperature range.
An aircraft propulsion system comprising:
- a core engine configured to generate an exhaust gas flow;
- a cryogenic fuel system including a fuel pump configured to communicate a primary fuel flow to the core engine;
- a superconducting electrical device operable at a cryogenic temperature;
- a cooling system where a cooling fuel flow is utilized for maintaining the superconducting electrical device at the cryogenic temperature;
- an ejector where the primary fuel flow from the fuel system drives the cooling fuel flow through the cooling system to form a combined fuel flow;
- and
- a separator where a first portion of the combined fuel flow from the ejector is routed to the core engine and a second portion of the combined fuel flow is routed back to the cooling system.
A superconducting thermal management system for an aircraft propulsion system comprising:
- a superconducting electrical device;
- a heat exchanger in thermal communication with the superconducting electrical device, the heat exchanger configured to transfer thermal energy from the superconducting electrical device into a cooling fuel flow;
- an ejector configured to receive a primary fuel flow and the cooling fuel flow, the ejector configured to drive the cooling fuel flow using the primary fuel flow and form a combined fuel flow with the primary fuel flow and the cooling fuel flow;
- a separator in fluid communication with the ejector and the heat exchanger and configured to separate the combined fuel flow into a first portion routed to a core engine and a second portion routed to the heat exchanger for cooling the superconducting electrical device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.