Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558

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Applied Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Experimental investigation on the feasibility of heat pipe cooling

for HEV/EV lithium-ion battery
Thanh-Ha Tran a, b, c, *, Souad Harmand a, b, Bernard Desmet a, b, Sebastien Filangi c
a
Université Lille Nord de France, 59000 Lille, France
b
UVHC, TEMPO, 59313 Valenciennes, France
c
PSA PEUGEOT CITROEN, France

h i g h l i g h t s

Constant heat flux was applied to a flat heat pipe cooling system.

Its thermal performance was compared with that of a heat sink under several cooling conditions.

The influence of the inclination was evaluated.

The heat pipe transient behaviour was also studied under variable input power.

Heat pipe was found to be an effective and low-energy solution for HEV/EV battery cooling.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this paper, the use of flat heat pipe as an effective and low-energy device to mitigate the temperature
Received 5 June 2013 of a battery module designed for a HEV application was investigated. For this purpose, nominal heat flux
Accepted 24 November 2013 generated by a battery module was reproduced and applied to a flat heat pipe cooling system. The
Available online 2 December 2013
thermal performance of the flat heat pipe cooling system was compared with that of a conventional heat
sink under various cooling conditions and under several inclined positions. The results show that adding
Keywords:
heat pipe reduced the thermal resistance of a common heat sink of 30% under natural convection and
Heat pipe
20% under low air velocity cooling. Consequently, the cell temperature was kept below 50  C, which
Transient input power
Cooling system
cannot be achieved using heat sink. According to the space allocated for the battery pack in the vehicle,
Lithium-ion battery flat heat pipe can be used in vertical or horizontal position. Furthermore, flat heat pipe works efficiently
Hybrid electric and electric vehicle under different grade road conditions. The transient behaviour of the flat heat pipe was also studied
under high frequency and large amplitude variable input power. The flat heat pipe was found to handle
more efficiently instant increases of the heat flux than the conventional heat sink.
Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Lithium-ion batteries possess a high energy density compared
with other secondary batteries; consequently, they are highly rec-
ommended as power sources for hybrid and electric vehicles (HEV/
EV) to provide longer driving range and faster acceleration. How-
ever, lithium-ion batteries have relatively poor performance at low
temperature and may suffer thermal runaway at high temperature.
For security reasons, a battery thermal management system (BTMS)
always includes an internal switch which is opened if the battery is
* Corresponding author. Université Lille Nord de France, 59000 Lille, France.
Tel.: þ33 620005163.
E-mail addresses: thanh-ha.tran@hotmail.fr, thanhha.tran@mpsa.com
(T.-H. Tran).
operated outside of its operating temperature range. This can pre-
vent fire or explosion risks but the battery would be temporarily
unavailable. Fuel economy of HEV and the driving range of EV are
consequently affected. Furthermore, lithium-ion batteries calendar
life and cycle life degrade quickly if kept or used at high
temperature.
The goal of a cooling system is to keep the battery pack within its
operating temperature range. The temperature distribution within
the pack should be even because temperature gradient could lead to
different ageing levels between cells and therefore, different charge/
discharge behaviours for each cell. For a Li-ion battery, the desired
operating temperature range is between 25  C and 50  C and the
temperature gradient should be less than 5  C [1]. In addition, the
cooling system has to meet the requirements of the vehicle such as:
reliable, compact, lightweight, easily accessible for maintenance,
low cost, and low power parasitic consumption.

1359-4311/$ e see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2013.11.048
552 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558

Nomenclature qb/a heat transfer rate between resin matrix nodes

b and a [W]
A cooling wall area [m2] qb/b heat transfer rate between 2 resin matrix nodes b [W]
Cpcell cell specific heat capacity [kJ kg1 K1] qb/wall heat transfer rate from resin matrix node b to the
Cpresin resin specific heat capacity [kJ kg1 K1] module wall [W]
Cpwall aluminium shell specific heat capacity [kJ kg1 K1] qwall/wallheat transfer rate between 2 module wall nodes [W]
dUo/dT cell entropy coefficient [V K1] R1 thermal resistance of the experimented
dt time step [s] system [ C W1]
hwall overall equivalent heat transfer R2 thermal resistance of the full size system [ C W1]
coefficient [W m2 K1] Ta temperature of the matrix node a [ C]
I cell current intensity [A] Tamb ambient temperature [ C]
i number of the surrounding nodes [e] Tb temperature of the matrix node b [ C]
ma mass of the matrix node a [kg] Tcell cell temperature [ C]
mb mass of the matrix node b [kg] Twall temperature of aluminium wall [ C]
mcell cell mass [kg] Uo open-circuit potential [V]
mwall aluminium shell mass [kg] U measured cell potential [V]
P heat input used for experiment [W]
qcell/a heat transfer rate from cell to its corresponding resin Greek symbols:
matrix node a [W] lcell radial thermal conductivity of the cell [W m1 K1]
qcell/b heat transfer rate from cell to its corresponding resin lresin thermal conductivity of the resin matrix [W m1 K1]
matrix node b [W] lwall thermal conductivity of the aluminium
qa/a heat transfer rate between 2 resin matrix nodes a [W] shell [W m1 K1]
qa/b heat transfer rate between resin matrix nodes F heat generated by cell [W]
a and b [W]

Up to now, battery cooling systems may use air, liquid (water/
oil/refrigerant), phase change materials (PCM), or a combination of
these methods. Each solution has its advantages and weaknesses.
Air cooling solution can be passive (i.e., only the ambient envi-
ronment is used) or active (i.e., a built-in source provides heating
and/or cooling). The obvious benefit of air-cooled systems is the
elimination of on-board chiller unit and coolant pump; leading to
savings in parasitic power consumption and weight. However, air
cooling system may use fan. If a high flow rate is needed, air cooling
may cause noise problem in the vehicle. Furthermore, due to its
poor thermal conductivity and thermal capacity, air convection
can’t be sufficient for heat dissipation from battery under stressful
and abuse conditions. The non-uniform distribution of temperature
within battery pack is also inevitable [2]. Compared with air cool-
ing, liquid cooling offers higher cooling capacity at similar parasitic
pump/fan power [3] but is heavier, and costlier due to the use of
pump, tank, heat exchanger. Maintenance and repair of liquid
cooling systems are also complicated and costly. PCM systems have
high thermal energy storage capacity thanks to the use of latent
heat and therefore can effectively limit the temperature rise and
the temperature uniformity of the battery [4]. However, the weak
point that has limited widespread use of PCM system is its insuf-
ficient long term thermal stability.
It is well known that heat pipe has very high thermal conduc-
tivity and can maintain homogeneously the evaporator surface at
nearly constant temperature. This device also has flexible geometry
which can fit variable area spaces. Moreover, heat pipe has infinite
life and does not require any maintenance. Theses attractive char-
acteristics make heat pipe a promising candidate for HEV/EV battery
cooling. Previously, Mahefkey et al. [5] has judged heat pipe to be
suitable to mitigate the temperature of NieCd. Similar conclusion
has been drawn by Zhang et al. [6] for Ni-MH battery. Concerning Li-
ion battery, Wu et al. [7] have reported that the cell temperature
could be significantly reduced using heat pipe with aluminium fin
on the condenser section, especially with the help of a cooling fan at
the condenser section. More recently, Rao et al. [8] have investigated
experimentally the cooling performance of tube heat pipes with
condenser sections cooled by a water module. The battery
maximum temperature has been controlled below 50  C when the
heat generation rate was lower than 50 W. Coupled with the desired
battery temperature gradient, the heat generation rate should not
exceed 30 W. In other words, with well-designed heat pipes, the
temperature rise and temperature difference of power batteries can
be effectively controlled within desired range. However, only tube
heat pipe had been experimented and the behaviour of heat pipe
under high frequency variable power input had not been studied.
In this work, the use of flat heat pipe as an effective and low-
energy cooling solution for a HEV application lithium-ion battery
was investigated. Both constant and transient heat input conditions
were experimented. The thermal performance of heat pipe cooling
was compared with that of a conventional heat sink in order
to highlight the thermal performance enhancement of the heat
pipe.
2. Experimental set-up
2.1. The battery module description
We considered the use of flat heat pipe in order to mitigate the
temperature of a 14 cylindrical cells battery module designed for a
specific HEV application. Cells (7 Ah of capacity, 38 mm in diameter,
142 mm in height) were implemented in a thermally conductive
and electrically insulating resin matrix. The matrix helps keep cells
in place and increase the mechanical rigidity of the module.
Moreover, the matrix enhances the heat transfer between the cells
and the aluminium module walls, as well as the electric insulation
between the cells.
During charge and discharge, heat generated by cells can be
considered to be the sum of the resistive heat and the entropic heat [9e
11]. Consequently, the global heat generated can be determined by:
dU0
f ¼ IðU0  UÞ  IT (1)
dT
 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558
Fig. 1. Heat profile generated from cells.
Variable heat rejected by cells in the battery module during
standard driving cycle was calculated according to Eq. (1). The
nominal value has been found to be slightly over 100 W (Fig. 1).
In order to maintain the cells within their optimum temperature
range, heat generated needs to be evacuated through the module
walls. The two walls corresponding to the two ends of the cells
could not be used for cooling purpose. Indeed, one of those was
intended for bus bars and electric module installation and the other
was used for degassing system implement. Among the 4 remaining
walls of the battery module, optimal thermal performance could be
Cell
Aluminium shell
Copper
envelope
Capillary
structure
Fig. 3. Schematic of the experimented heat pipe.
553
achieved by applying cooling devices to the two larger ones
(162 mm in height by 291 mm in large) as shown in Fig. 2.
2.2. Experimental set-up
Instead of using directly the battery module as heat source for
experiment, a flat heater was used to reproduce the nominal heat
flux and an induction heating machine was employed to generate
the transient heat flux. Two laboratory size cooling systems were
investigated. The first system was a simple copper heat sink. The
heat sink base surface measured 39 mm in length by 16 mm in
width. In the second cooling system, the previous heat sink was
glued with thermal grease on the condenser surface of a flat heat
pipe. The structure of the heat pipe is presented in Fig. 3. The
copper envelope of the heat pipe was under partial vacuum. The
capillary structure was made of sintered copper powder. The
effective permeability of the capillary structure was 7  109 m2
and its hydraulic diameter was 40 mm. The heat pipe uses water as
working fluid. The peripheral surfaces of both the systems were
insulated; hence, heat was dissipated in to the surround air only
through the fins. Temperatures at different locations were
measured for each system using three K-type thermocouples which
have uncertainty of þ/1.5  C (Fig. 4).
2.2.1. Tests under constant input power
We first performed experiments under constant input power
condition. After stabilization, the nominal heat flux arrived to the
module cooling walls corresponds to the nominal heat generated
Resin matrix
Cooling systems
Upper end of cells:
Bus bars and electric module installation
Lower end of cells:
Degassing cover & channel
Fig. 2. Battery module.
6 mm
16 mm
39 mm
Water filling
Condenser
tube
Evaporator
554 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558
Heat sink
Heat input
Fig. 4. Schematic of heat sink and heat pipe cooling systems.
by cells divided to the cooling walls surface area and equals to
0.115 W/cm2. We wanted to test the cooling systems under the
same heat flux as that arrived to the module cooling wall; conse-
quently, the total heat input P of 0.72 W was reproduced using a
23 U flat heater and applied to both the cooling systems. Their
thermal performance was evaluated under various cooling condi-
tions and under several inclined positions.
Under forced convection conditions, air was blown toward the
fins using a flow channel. Fig. 5a shows air blown over the fins for
cooling system in vertical position. For cooling system in horizontal
position, air flowed through the fins as shown in Fig. 5b. Mea-
surements of the air velocity were made along the fin array using a
hot-wire anemometer with measuring range from 0.15 to 30 m/s
(Fig. 5a and b). The accuracy of the anemometer was 3% of
reading þ0.05 m/s for air flow ranging from 0.15 to 3 m/s and 3%
of reading þ0.2 m/s for air flow ranging from 3.1 to 30 m/s. Three air
velocities were experimented (0.2 m/s, 0.5 m/s and 1.5 m/s).
2.2.2. Tests under transient input power
Finally, the transient behaviour of heat pipe was studied under
variable input power produced using an induction heating machine
with a reactive power at inductor of 32 kVAR. The output power of
the induction generator could be piloted between 10% and 100% of
its maximal capacity using a 0-10 V controller. A specific work coil
was designed according to the shape of the conductive work surface
to be heated. In induction heating, heat absorbed by the work sur-
face depends on the distance between the latter and the coil. Ac-
cording to the power range of this application, the coil was placed at
Flat heater
Fig. 5. a e Schematic of the air channel with cooling device in vertical position. b e Flow direction for cooling device in horizontal position (Insulation and thermocouples are not
represented).
Heat pipe
Heat sink
Insulation
K-type thermocouples
Heat input
a distance of 10 mm to the surface to be heated of each cooling
system as shown in Fig. 6 (cooling system was placed in horizontal
position, insulation and thermocouples are not represented).
A thermal infrared camera was used in order to verify that the
magnetic field generated by the current in the coil did not affect the
thermocouples measurement accuracy. In this regard, work sur-
faces on which thermocouples were fixed using aluminium tape
were coated with 0.95 emissivity black paint. It was found that in
our experiment, temperatures indicated by thermocouples corre-
sponded to that given by thermal camera, whether the induction
heating system was turned on or shut off.
Each test condition was experimented three times and the
reproducibility has been found to be good. The temperature devi-
ation between tests under iso conditions was lower than 2.0  C. For
all of the tests, the temperatures measured at different locations of
the heater/cooling system interface were very close to each other
and the margin was less than 1.0  C. Hence, only the mean tem-
perature was reported in this paper.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. AMESim model of the battery module
In a configuration such as shown in Fig. 2, cooling devices are
not in direct contact with cells but the battery module walls.
Consequently, temperature measured at the heater/cooling system
interface in our experiment corresponds to the battery module
walls temperature and there will be a temperature gradient
Air velocity
measurements Fan
 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558 555

Induction
heating coil

Fig. 6. Schematic of cooling systems under induction heating coil.

Overall equivalent heat

transfer coefficient (hwall)

Adiabatic
wall Adiabatic
wall

Overall equivalent heat Aluminum Shell

Nodes b Nodes a
transfer coefficient (hwall) Cells (mwall, Cpwall, λwall)
Resin matrix (ma, mb, Cpresin, λresin) (mcell, Cpcell, λcell, Φ)

Fig. 7. Battery module scheme and data used for AMESim modelling.

between module walls and cells. In order to estimate cell temper- stabilization of the model with the heater/cooling system interface
ature at different locations of the module, a numerical model of the temperatures measured experimentally. The cell temperature at
module was developed using AMESim software [12]. This model different locations of the module could also be evaluated using this
took into account the module geometry, the mass, the thermal AMESim model.
characteristics of different components (cell, resin matrix, In order to quantify the thermal performance of the cooling
aluminium shell) and finally the heat generated from cells. systems used in our experiment, we calculated the thermal resis-
It was assumed that the temperature is homogeneous within tance according to:
each cell. A 28 elements mesh was generated for 2D modelling of
the resin matrix. Each cell was surrounded by 2 resin matrix nodes: ðT  Tamb Þ
R1 ¼ (6)
a and b (Fig. 7). The aluminium shell was modelled using 14 ele- P
ments corresponding to the 14 exterior resin matrix nodes b. The The tested cooling systems were laboratory small size pro-
two smaller walls of the module were considered adiabatic. In or- totypes. The thermal resistance of the full size cooling system to be
der to model cooling systems applied to the two larger walls, implemented in the battery module could be calculated from the
whether heat sink or heat pipe system was used, an overall overall equivalent heat transfer coefficient given by the AMESim
equivalent heat transfer coefficient was employed. Hence, the cell model:
energy balance was expressed as below:
1
dT R2 ¼ (7)
mcell Cpcell cell ¼ f  qcell/a  qcell/b (2) hwall A
dt
The energy balances for resin matrix nodes a and b are the
following: 3.2. Tests in horizontal position

dTa X
ma Cpresin ¼ qcell/a  qa/ai  qa/b (3) In horizontal position, under constant input power condition
dt i and natural convection, heat pipe cooling was found to be far more
dTb X effective than heat sink cooling. After stabilization, the heater/heat
ma Cpre sin ¼ qcell/b  qb/a  qb/bi  qb/wall (4) sink interface temperature reached 46.0  C whereas that of the
dt
i heater/heat pipe interface was kept at 38.0  C (Fig. 8). The thermal
Finally, the energy balance for the wall is: resistance of both the systems was reported in Table 1. Adding heat
pipe to a common heat sink reduced the thermal resistance of the
dTwall X cooling system of about 30%.
mwall Cpwall ¼ qb/wall  qwall/walli
dt According to these experimental temperatures, respective
i
overall equivalent heat transfer coefficient was computed for each
 hwall AðTwall  Tamb Þ (5) cooling system thank to the AMESim model aforementioned.
The overall equivalent heat transfer coefficient could be deter- Consequently, cell temperature at different locations of the module
mined by fitting the steady state wall temperature after could be determined. Results were reported in Table 1. The
556 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558

Fig. 9. Heater/heat pipe interface temperatures in horizontal and vertical positions.

Fig. 8. Heater/cooling system interface temperatures under natural and forced
convection.

when the temperature was lower or equal to 29  C, contrarily to

Table 1 what is intended. The partial vacuum created while producing this
Natural convection: Temperatures after stabilization for heat sink and heat pipe heat pipe was certainly higher than what it should have been. Ac-
cooling. cording to the temperature measured under the first cooling con-
Heat sink Heat pipe dition, the operating temperature of the experimented heat pipe
Module wall temperature (measured experimentally) 46.0  C 38.0  C
was certainly between 29  C and 33  C.
Thermal resistance R1 (calculated from experimental 36  C/W 25  C/W Even though the prototype heat pipe did not work at temper-
data) ature close to that of the ambient, this does not call into question
Coolest cell temperature (estimated using AMESim 55.7  C 48.4  C the benefits of using heat pipe under natural convection and under
model)
the first cooling condition. Overall, heat pipe can be an effective and
Hottest cell temperature (estimated using AMESim 57.3  C 49.5  C
model) low-energy solution for lithium-ion batteries cooling. The sup-
Thermal resistance R2 (estimated using AMESim 0.480  C/W 0.332  C/W pression/reduction of the parasitic power consumption in battery
model) thermal management helps increase the HEV/EV autonomy and
Stabilization time (estimated using AMESim model) 3500 s 2500 s
helps reduce it running cost and thus contributes to the wider use
Cell temperature goes over 50  C after 800 s e
(estimated using AMESim model)
of HEV/EV.

3.3. Tests in vertical and inclined positions

temperature gradient within the pack was mainly due to the larger
volume of the resin matrix nodes surrounding the cells in the 4
corners. These cells were the coolest and the hottest were those in
the centre of the module. We noticed that cell temperatures exceed
the upper operating limit which (50  C) with heat sink cooling
while all cells were kept below 50  C with heat pipe cooling.
Three forced convection configurations were also performed;
20.0  C air was blown at different velocities, from 0.2 m/s to 0.5 m/s
and 1.5 m/s. We remarked that under the first cooling condition, the
thermal performance of the heat pipe was better than that of the
heat sink (20% reduction of the thermal resistance). Unfortunately,
the results under the second and the third cooling conditions
showed that heat pipe did not perform better than heat sink
(Table 2). The flat heat pipe was aimed to be able to work even
under ambient temperature (w20  C). However, the above exper-
imental results make us believe that the phase change did not occur
Heat pipe was tested in vertical position and no significant
evolution in cooling performance was noticed compared with that
in horizontal position (Fig. 9). This result means that the flat heat
pipe tested can be used in both vertical and horizontal positions,
which leaves a degree of freedom open to best match the battery
pack with the space allocated for it in the vehicle.
The evaluation of the battery cooling system performance under
uphill and downhill drive conditions is necessary for a vehicle
application. Common roads are usually graded below 10% (5.71 ).
Inclines of over 20% (11.31 ) are rare and maximum known incline
on public streets is 37% (20.31 ). Hence, in this part, heat pipe in
horizontal and vertical positions were inclined with an angle of 10
and 20 . Fig. 10 shows a very slight evolution of the heater/heat
pipe interface temperature between various incline positions. The
temperature deviation was found to be less or equal to 2.0  C. This

Table 2
Forced convection: Temperatures after stabilization for heat sink and heat pipe cooling.

Heat sink Heat pipe

0.2 m/s 0.5 m/s 1.5 m/s 0.2 m/s 0.5 m/s 1.5 m/s

Module wall temperature 37.0  C 29.0  C 24.0  C 33.5  C 29.0  C 25.0  C

Thermal resistance R1 24  C/W 13  C/W 5.6  C/W 19  C/W 13  C/W 6.9  C/W
Coolest cell temperature 47.5  C 39.5  C 34.5  C 43.9  C 39.5  C 35.5  C
Hottest cell temperature 48.4  C 40.4  C 35.4  C 44.8  C 40.5  C 36.4  C
Thermal resistance R2 0.313  C/W 0.166  C/W 7.37  102  C/W 0.249  C/W 0.166  C/W 9.30  102  C/W
Stabilization time 3000 s 1700 s 1300 s 2500 s 1700 s 1300 s
 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558
Fig. 10. Heater/heat pipe interface temperatures in various inclined positions under natural convection.
means flat heat pipe works efficiently under different grade road
conditions. In Ref. [13], the authors had also found out that thanks
to the capillary system, when the working fluid was not over-
charged, the orientation of the heat pipe had little effect on its
thermal performance.
3.4. Tests under transient condition
In real life driving conditions, battery power solicitation profiles
are always dynamic. Consequently, heat profiles generated from
batteries are of large amplitude and high frequency, unlike those
produced by other electronic and electric devices. Fig. 1 is a typical
example of how heat generated by cells has highly variable am-
plitudes and short durations.
For battery module with cells inserted in a resin matrix and
cooling systems applied to module walls such as shown in Fig. 2,
transient heat arrived to cooling devices was computed using the
AMESim model presented in previous section. We remarked in
Fig. 11 that the heat profile at cooling wall has slight fluctuation and
very smooth shape. This is due to large heat capacity of the cells and
the resin matrix. Consequently, the influence of the variation of
heat flux on the heat pipe behaviour would be very slim.
However, in case of larger variation in cell heat loss or lower
module heat capacity or direct contact between cooling device and
cells, heat arrived to cooling system may vary rapidly and have
larger amplitude; hence, the transient behaviour of the heat pipe
would be more prominent and investigation of this transient
behaviour is necessary. Fig. 11 shows the heat profile at cooling
Fig. 11. Heat profile at module wall and at cell wall.
557
system/cell wall interface, obtained by AMESim modelling for
configuration where cooling device is in direct contact with cells.
The corresponding heat flux was reproduced repeatedly using in-
duction heating machine in order to study the transient behaviour
of the flat heat pipe.
Fig. 12a shows the work surface temperature for both cooling
systems. The heat flux applied was also added in this figure. We can
see that it consists of six identical cycles of 1460 s duration each.
Fig. 12b zooms in on the last cycle of Fig. 12a. We remark that the
work surface temperature in heat pipe cooling case was easily
lower than that in heat sink cooling case. After stabilization, in heat
pipe cooling case, the mean temperature obtained during a cycle of
variable heat flux (38.4  C) corresponded to the steady state tem-
perature measured under nominal constant input heat flux in the
previous section (38.0  C). On the contrary, in heat sink cooling
case, the mean temperature obtained during a cycle of variable heat
flux (50.4  C) was about 4  C higher than the temperature
measured under nominal constant input heat flux (46.0  C).
Furthermore, the temperature fluctuation within cycle was also
smaller in heat pipe cooling case. These points make us believe that
in transient regime, heat pipe handled more efficiently instant in-
creases of the heat flux than conventional heat sink. Consequently,
it can keep the temperature close to that obtained with a nominal
heat flux with slight fluctuation (Table 3).
3.5. Further discussions
Up to now, the weak point that has limited widespread use of
heat pipe system is its high cost due to the complicated fabrication
process and the use of copper, an expensive metal, as wick and wall
material. However, recent researches on aluminium heat pipe
manufacturing [14,15] have revealed efficient and reliable way to
decrease the heat pipe cost. Furthermore, the use of aluminium also
helps reduce the weight of the cooling system, which is highly
appreciable in HEV/EV application.
In order to validate the use of heat pipe in automotive applica-
tion, aside from the impact of the inclination due different grade
roads, investigation on the influence of the vehicle shock and vi-
bration to the heat pipe thermal performance is unavoidable. In our
study, the flat heat pipe was not tested under vibration environ-
ment; however, the influence of vibration on the heat pipe heat
transfer has been investigated in some relevant studies. Connors
and Zunner [16] have investigated the thermal performance of a flat
heat pipe with copper powder wick structure. The flat heat pipe has
demonstrated no degradation of the thermal performance under
military vehicle shock and vibration conditions. More recently, Guo
et al. [17] have investigated the influence of mechanical vibration on
the heat transfer characteristics for rectangular microgrooves. It has
been found that the vibration movement enlarge the wetting area
558 T.-H. Tran et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 63 (2014) 551e558
Fig. 12. a) Heater/cooling system interface temperatures under transient heat flux (during 6 cycles, in horizontal position, under natural convection). b) Heater/cooling system
interface temperatures under transient heat flux (zoom-in on the last cycle of a).
Table 3
Transient heat flux: Steady state work surface temperature for heat sink and heat
pipe cooling.
Work surface temperature Heat sink
Mean value for 1 cycle 50.4  C
Maximum value for 1 cycle 52.4  C
Minimum value for 1 cycle 48.0  C
Temperature variation for 1 cycle 4.3  C
and intensified consequently the heat transfer of the microgroove.
Consequently, the heat pipe seems to be able to work under vibra-
tion environment without any thermal performance degradation.
4. Conclusion
In order to extend the battery life and decrease HEV/EV cost,
battery should be operated within its optimum temperature range
with low power parasitic consumption. The use of flat heat pipe as
an effective and low-energy cooling device for a HEV application
lithium-ion battery was considered under different conditions.
According to experimental results, the following conclusions could
be drawn:
(1) Flat heat pipe can be an effective and low-energy solution for
battery cooling. Adding heat pipe reduced the thermal
resistance of a common heat sink of 30% under natural
convection and 20% under low air velocity cooling. Conse-
quently, the cell temperature was kept below 50  C, which
cannot be achieved using heat sink.
(2) According to the space allocated for the battery pack in the
vehicle, flat heat pipe can be used in vertical or horizontal
position. Furthermore, flat heat pipe works efficiently under
different grade road conditions.
(3) Under high frequency and large amplitude variable heat
generated condition, heat pipe handled more efficiently
instant increases of the heat flux than conventional heat sink
and minimized the temperature fluctuation during transient
cycle.
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