INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR.

KEERTHI KUMAR N

BMS
Institute of Technology and Management

Department of Mechanical Engineering

NOTES
of

INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL
ENGINEERING
BESCK204D

by

Dr. Keerthi Kumar N

Assistant Professor,
Department of Mechanical Engineering
BMS Institute of Technology and Management
Yelahanka, Bangalore

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N

Module 1
Refrigeration

Refrigeration
It is the science of producing and maintaining temperature below that of surrounding atmosphere. This
means the removing of heat from a substance to be cooled.
In simple, refrigeration means the cooling of or removal of heat from a system. The equipment
employed to maintain the system at a low temperature is termed as refrigerating system.
Refrigeration works on the principle of second law of Thermodynamics.

Application of refrigeration
1. Ice making.
2. Transportation of foods above and below freezing.
3. Industrial air- conditioning.
4. Comfort air- conditioning of hospitals, hotels, theatres etc.
5. Chemical and related industries to preserve the things.
6. Processing food products and beverages.
7. Oil refining and synthetic rubber manufacturing.
8. Sophisticated machines such as CNC machines, PC’s, electronic gadgets perform well only in
AC atmosphere.

Refrigerant
It is defined as “any substance that absorbs heat through expansion and loss it through condensation in a
refrigeration system”.
OR.
“It is a medium of heat transfer which absorbs heat by evaporating at a low temperature and gives up
heat by condensing at high temperature and pressure”.

Classification of refrigerants
The refrigerants are classified as follows:
1. Primary refrigerants: these are working medium or heat carries which directly take part in
the refrigeration system and cool substance by absorption of latent heat. Ex: Ammonia, Carbon
dioxide, Sulphur dioxide, Methyl chloride etc.

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N
2. Secondary refrigerants: these are circulating substance which are first cooled with the help
of the primary refrigerants and are then employed for cooling purposes. Ex: Ice, CO2 etc.

Properties of refrigerants
1. Thermodynamic properties:
a. Low boiling point.

b. Low freezing point.

c. A good refrigerant should have high critical temperature.

d. Refrigerant should have high latent heat of vaporization: It should be as large as

possible to reduce the weight of the refrigerant to be circulated in the system or to
absorb maximum heat in the liquid state.
2. Physical properties:
a. Low specific heat in liquid phase: to cool to lower temperature.
b. Low specific volume: to have smaller compressor capacities.
c. High thermal conductivity: High heat transfer co-efficient when thermal conductivity
is high.
d. Low viscosity: to reduce the friction and pumping cots.
e. High electrical insulation.
3. Chemical properties:
a. Non toxicity: should not cause irritant.
b. Nonflammable and non-explosive.
c. Non corrosiveness.
d. High chemical stability
e. No effect on the quantity of stored products like flower etc.
f. Colorless and odor less.

4. Other properties:
a. High COP
b. Ease of leakage location
c. Ease of handling
d. Low power consumption/ ton of refrigeration.
e. Availability and low cost.

List of commonly used refrigerants

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N

➢ Air and water: Aircrafts and absorbent in Vapor absorption refrigeration system.
➢ Ammonia: Used in Ice plant, cold storage plants etc.
➢ Sulphur dioxide: In household refrigerators.
➢ Carbon dioxide: In marine refrigerators.
➢ Methyl chloride: Domestic and Industrial refrigerators.
➢ Freon (F12 and F22): F12 used in domestic refrigerators and F22 in air conditioning

1. Air and Water: These are one of the first developed refrigerants and they are having good general
properties such as colorless, odorless, easily and cheaply available, non-toxic, non-flammable, non-
corrosive etc. but they are not very efficient compared to recently developed ones and so are not used
much. Air being lighter is used as refrigerant in aircraft and also where completely non-toxic medium
is needed. Water is still used as absorbent in vapour absorber refrigeration system.

2. Ammonia: Ammonia as a refrigerant is employed in refrigerators operating on the absorption

principles. Because of its high latent and low specific volume it produces high refrigeration effect even
in small refrigerators. Because of its toxic, flammable, irritating and food destroying properties makes
it unsuitable for domestic refrigerators. But it is widely in cold storage, ice making plants etc.

3. Sulphur dioxide: It has better thermodynamic properties, it has low refrigerating effect and high
specific volume, therefore large capacity and high speed compressors are required. Since it combines
with water and forms sulfurous and sulfuric acids which are corrosive to metals and also very toxic so
these refrigerants are not preferred.

4. Carbon dioxide: The efficiency of the refrigerators are less when the refrigerant is carbon dioxide
and it is used only in making of dry ice (Solid carbon dioxide) and marine refrigeration and its having
good properties like colorless, odorless, non-toxic, non-flammable, non-corrosive etc.

5. Methyl chloride: It is also colorless, odorless, generally non-flammable, and non-toxic but it will
catch the fire at certain occasions and hence it is not preferred.

6. Freon: Freon group of refrigerants is used almost universally domestic refrigerators. These
refrigerants are colorless, odorless, nontoxic, nonflammable, non-explosive and noncorrosive. The
Freon-12 and Freon-22 are two Freon refrigerants commonly used in domestic refrigerator and air-
conditioners. It has been found that these refrigerants posing a major threat to the global environment
through their role in the destruction of ozone layer.

Definitions and terminology of refrigeration and air-conditioning

Refrigerating effect: It is the rate of absorption of heat from the refrigerating cycle by the refrigerant
in a refrigerating process.

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N

Ton of refrigeration: The capacities of refrigerating system are rated in terms of “Ton of
refrigeration”. It is defined as; “One ton of refrigeration is the capacity of a refrigeration
system/process/equipment to extract heat from one ton of water at 0°C and convert it into one ton of
Ice in 24 hours”.

Ice making capacity: It is the ability of a refrigerator or refrigerating process to make an ice from
water at room temperature.

Co-efficient of Performance (COP): The performance of a refrigeration system is expressed by a

term known as the “Co-efficient of performance”, which is defined as the ratio of heat absorbed by the
refrigerant while passing through the evaporator to the work input required to compress the refrigerant
in the compressor. OR. It is defined as the ratio of quantity of heat absorbed to the work supplied in a
process.

COP is greater than 1. The higher the COP, the higher the cooling efficiency

Relative COP: The COP can also be estimated theoretically by thermodynamic equations. The ratio
of actual measured COP to the theoretical COP is known as relative COP.

Where: Actual COP= Ratio of Q and W actually measured during a test.

Theoretical COP = Ratio of theoretical values of Q and W obtained by applying laws of
thermodynamics to the refrigeration cycle.

Principle and working of vapor compression refrigeration system

The Vapor compression Refrigerator (VCR) system is the most important system from the view point
of commercial and domestic utility. In this system the working fluid is a vapor (Freon F-12).

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N

Fig.1. Vapor compression refrigeration system

It readily evaporates and condenser or changes alternatively between the vapor and liquid phases
without leaving the refrigerating plant. During evaporation, it absorbs heat from the cold body. This
heat is used as its latent heat for converting it from the liquid to vapor. In condensing or cooling, it
rejects heat to external body, thus creating a cooling effect in the working fluid.
This refrigeration system thus acts as a latent heat pump since it pumps its latent heat from the cold
body and rejects it to the external hot body or cooling medium, the principle upon which the vapor
compression system works.
In a simple vapor compression system fundamental process are completed in one cycle. They are:
Compression, Condensation, Expansion, and Vaporization. The flow diagram of such a cycle is shown
in Fig.1.
The refrigerant in the form of vapor at low pressure and temperature enters to the compressor where it
is compressed isentropically and subsequently its temperature and pressure increases. This vapor after
leaving the compressor enters the condenser where it is condensed into high pressure liquid and heat is
transferred from the hot compressed refrigerant vapor to cooling medium and is collected in a receiver
tank. From the receiver tank it passes through the expansion valve here it is throttled down to a lower
pressure and has a low temperature. It finally passes on to the evaporator where it absorbs heat from
the surrounding or circulating fluid being refrigerated and vaporizes to low pressure and the cycle is

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N
repeated.
Principe of air- conditioning
Air conditioner continuously draws the air from a indoor space to be cooled, cools it by the
refrigeration principles and discharge back into the same indoor space that needs to be cooled. This
continuous cyclic process of drawing, cooling and recirculation of the cooled air keeps the indoor
space cool at the required lower temperature needed for comfort cooling or industrial cooling
purposes.

Applications of air conditioner

➢ Industrial applications: To control chemical and bio-chemical reactions. Example:
Photographic industry, Textile, Printing, Machine tool industry. Etc.
➢ Commercial applications: Theaters, Hotels, Banks, Etc.
➢ Transportation applications: Automobiles, Trains, Ships, Aircrafts Etc.
➢ Special Applications: TV Centers, Computer control rooms, Automatic telephone exchange
buildings, Hospitals Etc.

Room air conditioner and principle of air conditioning

The A.C unit is installed in the window. Its main components are:
(i) Evaporator, (ii) Compressor, (iii) Air filter, (iv) Capillary tube, (v) Motor, and (vi) Fans.

Fig. 2. shows the room air conditioner. A room air conditioner provides cooling by drawing warm air
from the space or room over the evaporator (indoor coil). The air gives up its latent and sensible heat
as it passes over this coil. Humidity is reduced, since air is cooled below its dew point, and water
precipitates out of the air. Cooled, drier air then is delivered back to the space or room by the
evaporator fan. The compressor raises the pressure of the refrigerant, which increases its temperature
to a level higher than that of the outside air. Heated refrigerant vapor flows on to the condenser
(outside coil), where it is cooled by a fan blowing outside air over the coils. When cooled, the
refrigerant condenses to a high pressure liquid. The resulting liquid refrigerant flows through a
capillary tube where its pressure and temperature are reduced. The refrigerant then reenters the
evaporator — and the cycle repeats. The motor operates both the evaporator fan and the condenser fan.

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 INTRODUCTION TO MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (BESCK204D) DR. KEERTHI KUMAR N

Fig. 2. Room air conditioner

Comparison between refrigerator and air conditioner

Sl. Refrigerator Air conditioner
No.
1 Maintains the temperature of space well It controls temperature, Humidity, Quality and
below surroundings purity of air
2 Always cools to lower temperature Cools in summer and heats in winter
3 Unit is located inside the room Evaporator and expansions valve are placed
inside, Compressor and Condenser are placed
outside
4 Fan and blower is not required Fan and blower is required
5 Capacity is high Capacity is low
6 More in weight Light in weight
7 Mainly used to preserve perishables Used for providing congenial atmosphere for
human comfort.