International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013

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International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

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

A study on the effects of geometric parameters in a low-temperature-

differential c-type Stirling engine using CFD
Wen-Lih Chen
Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, National Cheng Kung University, No. 1, University Road, Tainan City 701, Taiwan, ROC

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

Article history: This study conducts a parametric investigation on a c-type low temperature differential Stirling engine
Received 21 March 2016 (LTDSE) using CFD. The effects on engine performance posed by four geometrical parameters namely
Received in revised form 3 October 2016 phase angle between power piston and displacer, gap width between displacer and displacer cylinder,
Accepted 2 November 2016
length of displacer, and length of power piston linkage bar, are systematically examined. One crucial
Available online 9 November 2016
advantage of using CFD is that temperature and velocity vector fields in engine space can be obtained,
allowing important physical processes to be studied in great detail. Then the physical mechanisms
Keywords:
through which a parameter affects engine performance can be identified. It is found that all four param-
LTDSE
CFD
eters are quite influential on engine performance despite that they are of little effect on the magnitude of
Parametric study engines compression ratio. Within the ranges of parameters examined here, they affect engine perfor-
mance by margins up to 32% on indicated power and 13% on efficiency. The results highlight the impor-
tance of every geometrical parameter on overall engine performance, and the information concluded in
this study is very useful for the design of a new LTDSE.
2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction temperature heat sources of a LTDSE is exactly its Achilles heel.

Low temperature differential Stirling engines (LTDSEs) are a
class of Stirling engines that utilize low temperature heat sources
to operate. Although the criterion for the heat source temperature
of a LTDSE is not clearly defined, it is generally accepted that an
engine using a heat source below 100 C can be qualified as low
temperature. The criterion of 100 C is set for a good reason.
Water boils at 100 C under 1 atm. If the temperature of heat
source is limited below 100 C, energy within waste hot water
from many industrial processes that is now discharged into the
environment can be used as the heat source of a LTDSE. Using
low-temperature heat sources is one of LTDSEs greatest advan-
tages because there are abundant cheap (or even free), readily
available low temperature heat sources, including solar, geother-
mal, biomass, industrial waste heat, etc. In addition, low-
temperature operation allows LTDSEs to acquire cheap construc-
tion materials such as plastic. This together with their simple
design and construction largely reduce the manufacturing costs
and help the proliferation of LTDSEs. Therefore, when used in large
quantity, LTDSEs have the potential to offset the greenhouse gas
emission from burning fossil fuel and ease some pressure on the
environment. Ironically, the great advantage of using low-
E-mail address: wlchen@mail.ncku.edu.tw
The power and efficiency of a LTDSE is usually very low due to
the low exergy of its heat source. Nevertheless, a few reports have
demonstrated some LTDSEs capability to generate Watt-level
power. Kongtragool and Wongwises [1] constructed a four-power
piston solar c-type LTDSE which can generate 6.1 W of shaft
power. Hoshino and Yoshihara [2] reported a b-type LTDSE using
charged helium (0.5 MPa) as working gas, expansion space temper-
ature at 100 C, coolant temperature at 20 C, and engine speed of
35 Hz, being able to produce 11.8 W of indicated power. Unfortu-
nately, these LTDSEs are either very large or requiring elaborated
design to contain pressurized gas. Today, LTDSEs are generally
used only for their model value and have not yet been put into
practical use in a large scale. If the low-efficiency problem can be
improved, the value of LTDSEs can be much more appreciated than
it is today. They will serve beyond the roles of toy or educational
tools as they mostly do today. Therefore, much study is still
needed to improve LTDSEs performance before their full potential
can be materialized.
Stirling engines can be broadly classified into a, b, and c types
according to their configurations. Among them, the c type is the
most adopted type for LTDSEs. Kongtragool [3] concluded from
his review study that the most appropriate type for LTDSEs should
be c-configuration, double-acting, and vertical positioning. Such
configuration would yield highest mechanical efficiency (least fric-

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2016.11.007
0017-9310/ 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013
Nomenclature
cp constant pressure specific heat (kJ kg1 K1)
k thermal conductivity (W m1 K1)
Lp length of power piston (m)
l1 length of the power piston linkage bar (m)
l2 length of the power piston connection rod (m)
l3 length of the displacer linkage bar (m)
l4 length of the displacer connection rod (m)
ld height of displacer (m)
m mass (kg)
p pressure (Pa)
q heat transfer rate per unit area (W m2)
Q heat transfer rate (W)
R gas constant (J kg1 K1)
R universal gas constant, 8.314 J K1 mol1
R1 outer radius of the power piston (m)
R2 inner radius of the displacer cylinder (m)
Rd outer radius of the displacer (m)
Rk thermal conductivity ratio between solid and gas mate-
rials
r1 crank radius of the power piston (m)
r2 crank radius of the displacer (m)
t time (s)
tp time period of a cycle (s)
T temperature (K)
ui velocity components respectively in xi-directions
(m s1)
tion loss) which is very important for low-power engines like
LTDSEs because large mechanical friction would easily cancel a
LTDSEs output work and render it useless. Therefore, the current
study focuses on a c-type LTDSE.
In classical thermodynamics analysis, a Stirling engine cycle is a
close cycle that operates between two temperature reservoirs, one
at higher temperature and the other at lower temperature. It
includes an isothermal expansion process (heat input from high-
temperature reservoir to engine), an isometric cooling process, an
isothermal compression process (waste heat discharged to low-
temperature reservoir), and an isometric heating process. In each
process, equilibrium state is assumed to hold all the time. This
gives rise to formulas governing the output work and efficiency
of an ideal Stirling cycle as:
W nRT H  T L lnV r ; 1 results when applied to different engines. Mahkamov [4] reported
TH
g1 ; 2
TL
where n and R are respectively mole number of the working gas and
universal gas constant, TH and TL are respectively the temperatures
at the hot and cold ends of the engine, and Vr is engines compres-
sion ratio which is the maximum engine volume divided by the
minimum engine volume. Note that the only geometrical parameter
in Eq. (1) is Vr, and Eq. (2) even suggests that no geometrical param-
eter will affect efficiency. That is, the only geometrical parameter
that matters is Vr. Apparently classic thermodynamics analysis
has oversimplified the physics and configuration of a real Stirling
engine, but it, at least, points out the importance of Vr. In reality,
however, there are at least a dozen geometrical parameters even
in a very simple Stirling engine, and each of them might play a role
on engines performance. To study a Stirling engine more accu-
rately, more sophisticated models are needed.
Many numerical models for studying Stirling engines have been
developed. A detailed overview on these models can be found in
1003
~ bi
u local frame moving velocity components respectively in
xi-directions (m s1)
V volume (m3)
Vr compression ratio
W engine indicated power (W)
xi components of Cartesian coordinate system (m)
Greeks
b crank angle of the displacer (rad or )
d gap width between displacer and displacer wall,
d R2  Rd (m)
q density (kg m3)
g engine efficiency (%)
h crank angle of power piston (rad or )
/ phase angle, / h  b (rad or )
l viscosity (Pas)
x engine speed (rpm or rads1)
Superscripts
b cell boundary
d displacer
p power piston
Subscripts
H hot end
L cold end
Mahkamov [4]. Based on their chronological hierarchy, these are
generally categorized into first-, second-, and third-order models.
The greatest advantage of these models is that they only require
very little CPU time to return a solution, making them very suitable
for design optimization. However, they are generally zero- or one-
dimension models and often adopt some empirical or ad hoc con-
stants or formulas to estimate heat transfer rates or energy losses.
For example, the model proposed in Cheng et al. [5] assumes con-
stant regenerator effectiveness and constant heat transfer coeffi-
cients in expansion and compression chambers. Consequently,
their abilities to resolve the complicated physical processes in a
real Stirling engine are quite limited. The disadvantages of these
methods are their unsatisfactory predictive accuracy and lack of
generality. The latter means that a well-tuned model to match
the experimental data of one particular engine may not yield good
an overestimation of the power of a solar Stirling engine by 250%
by a second-order model. Therefore, these classes of models are
often used in the early design stage of an engine to obtain some
preliminary results.
A real Stirling engine configuration is multi-dimensional, con-
taining multiple geometrical parameters that cannot be studied
thoroughly by the above zero- or one-dimensional models. Com-
putational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been used successfully in
many industries to obtain accurate predictions. One of important
advantages of CFD is its capability to model multi-dimensional
geometries, allowing designers to investigate the effects of differ-
ent geometrical parameters. Another important advantage is its
general applicability to different engines because its governing
equations do not include any empirical constant or formula.
When used for Stirling engine analysis, it is able to return more
accurate predictions on Stirling engines performance than the
aforementioned models. For example, CFD only overestimates
the power of the same solar Stirling engine in Mahkamov [4]
by 40% instead of 250% by a second-order model. This might be
an extreme example of a second-order model which does not
1004 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013

represent its average accuracy. It, at least, shows that CFD is

quantitatively more accurate than a second-order model. How-
ever, CFD do have some disadvantages. First, it requires very long
CPU time to return a solution. This is especially so for Stirling
engine simulations because a periodic solution can only be
obtained after running several engine cycles in which each cycle
alone contains hundreds of time steps. Second, it needs a more
elaborated set-up procedure than the above models; and third,
there might be more solution convergence problems during pro-
gram execution. Overall, CFD can be a very useful tool to study
Stirling engines.
The reports on using CFD to study Stirling engines are much
fewer than those using other numerical models, supposedly due
to the challenges in CFD simulations. Mahkamov [4] used CFD to
study the cycle of a solar Stirling engine. A second-order model
was employed alongside for comparison purpose. He found that
the results in terms of temperature distribution and engine perfor-
mance obtained by the two methods are quite different. Compared
with the experimental data, the engine power returned by CFD is
much more accurate than that by the second-order model. Later,
Mahkamov [6] conducted another CFD study to improve the perfor-
mance of a biomass Stirling engine. The results demonstrated a
great advantage mentioned earlier of using CFD to study a real
engine. Some minor geometrical features that impede engine per-
formance have been identified, and engine performance has been
improved significantly by modifying those features. Chen and
Chang [7] performed a CFD study on the heat transfer characteris-
tics of a twin-power-piston c-type LTDSE (Chen et al. [8]). The pur-
pose was to understand the complicated heat transfer Fig. 1. Definition of the geometrical parameters of the c-type LTDSE.
characteristics in a real Stirling engine cycle. It was concluded that
impingement is the major heat transfer mechanism, and the results
showed that temperature contours are three-dimensional and  q 
2
highly non-uniform across the entire engine space at any given xd3 b lc1  r 2 sin b l3  r 22 cos2 b l4 ld ; 4
moment. This implies that the practice of adopting uniform
momentary temperature for a certain engine space (expansion or where b h  /; and the velocities of piston and displacer are:
compression chamber) by some zero-dimensional models could
produce large errors. Chen et al. [9] further conducted a parametric r 2 x cos h sin h
up3 h r 1 x cos h  q1 ; 5
study on their c-type LTDSE. The effects of three geometrical and 2
l1  r 21 cos2 h
two operational parameters on engine performance are examined.
Since Eq. (1) suggests that compression ratio is a very important
geometrical parameter, all of the chosen geometrical parameters, r 2 x cos b sin b
ud3 b r 2 x cos b  q2 : 6
namely power-piston stroke and radius and displacer stroke, in 2
l3  r22 cos2 b
the study are strongly influential on the magnitude of the compres-
sion ratio. It was found that these parameters indeed pose profound The computational domain, shown in Fig. 2 through a mesh, only
effects on engine performance; and the larger the compression ratio covers a quarter of the entire engine space because the engine
they result in, the better the engines indicated work. adopts a twin power-piston configuration, making its geometry
As mentioned earlier, a real Stirling engine has at least a symmetrical with respect to x1 and x2 axes. The engine in Chen
dozen geometrical parameters; and each one of them might pose et al. [8] is large, and the flow inside the engine becomes turbulent
some impacts on engine performance. Chen et al. [9] has inves- even at relatively low engine speed. Hence in current study, the
tigated the effects of some geometrical parameters that are influ- engine size is reduced by a factor of 2. Table 1 lists the reduced
ential on the magnitude of the compression ratio of a c-type dimensions. This reduction makes the flow inside the engine
LTDSE. In the current study, the focus will be on some other geo- remains laminar under normal operational conditions of a LTDSE;
metrical parameters which have less effect on the value of com- therefore a turbulence model wont be needed. Since all turbulence
pression ratio but are of no less importance to engine models introduce some degree of modeling error; without using
performance. any turbulence modeling, current results will be turbulence-
modeling-error free. The displacer cylinder wall can be made of
acrylic (in many small LTDSEs) or metal (the LTDSE in [1]). Here,
2. Mathematical model the wall of displacer cylinder is assumed to be made of metal with
some thickness. In this case, Cheng and Yang [5] suggested that the
Fig. 1 shows the configuration and geometrical parameters of metal displacer cylinder wall can produce the effect of a regenerator
the current Stirling engine (originally reported in Chen et al. [8]). in small Stirling engines. This is due to the passive effect of thermal
This is a twin-power-piston c-type LTDSE. According to Fig. 1, loss from hot end to cold end. Additionally, the results in Salazar
the displacements of the piston and displacer are: and Chen [10] indicate that the displacer cylinder wall temperature
 q  can be reasonable assumed to take a fixed profile. The present
2 engine is not equipped with a regenerator. Although not very effec-
xp3 h lc1  r 1 sin h l1  r 21 cos2 h l2 ; 3
tive, the solid wall material of displacer cylinder provides functions
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013 1005

Continuity equation:
@q @
~i 0:
qu 7
@t @xi
Momentum equation:

@qui @   @p @2u
qu~ j ui  l 2i : 8
@t @xi @xi @xi
Energy equation:

@qT @ k @ 2 T 1 dp
~ i T
qu : 9
@t @xi cp @x2i cp dt

Equation of state:
pV mRT: 10
~ i ui 
In the above, u ubi ,
i = 1, 2, 3, are relative velocity components
between fluid and local moving frame which moves with ubi in xi
directions. The initial conditions are:
t 0s; ui 0; i 1; 2; 3; p 101:0 kPa; T T L : 11
Boundary conditions are:At hot end, x3 = 0:
ui 0; i 1; 2; 3; T T H : 12
At cold end, x3=lc1  lc2 and on the wall of power cylinder:
ui 0; i 1; 2; 3; T T L : 13
The surface of displacer is assumed adiabatic, thus the conditions on
displacer surfaces are:
@T
ui 0; i 1; 2; ui ud3 ; i 3; ! 0; 14
@n
Fig. 2. Computational mesh of the baseline engine.
!
where n is the direction normal to the wall of displacer. The surface
of power piston is also assumed adiabatic, giving:
Table 1 @T
The values of the geometrical parameters of the baseline Stirling ui 0; i 1; 2; ui up3 ; i 3; ! 0: 15
engine. @n
R1 (m) 0.0125 The temperature on the lateral wall of the displacer cylinder is
R2 (m) 0.0400 assumed to maintain at a fixed linear profile as:
Rd (m) 0.0390 x3
r1 (m) 0.0200 ui 0; i 1; 2; 3; T T L T H  T L : 16
r2 (m) 0.0125 lc1  lc2
l1 (m) 0.0850
l2 (m) 0.0050
l3 (m) 0.0510 3. Numerical procedure
l4 (m) 0.0775
ld (m) 0.0730
The present computer code is an in-house unstructured-mesh,
lc1 (m) 0.2250
lc2 (m) 0.1150 fully collocated, finite-volume code USTREAM developed by the
Lp (m) 0.0150 author. This code is the descendant of a structure-mesh multi-
block code STREAM by Lien et al. [11]. In this numerical proce-
dure, the total number of cells in the computational domain
remains unchanged throughout an engine cycle. However, to sim-
similar to regenerator. Due to the fact that heat capacity of a solid is ulate the motions of displacer and power piston, the positions of
much larger than that of gas, it is reasonable to assume that solid- cell boundaries in the expansion and compression chambers and
wall temperatures maintain either at a constant value (on the hot- power cylinder are changed according to Eqs. (3) to (6) in the x3-
or cold-end wall) or a fixed profile along the x3-direction (on the direction to increase or decrease the volumes of the cells, and col-
displacer cylinder wall). This allows the modeling of solid domain lectively, these cells simulate the expansion or compression of the
to be replaced by specifying temperature boundary conditions on engine volume just like the action of an accordion. The pressure-
gas domain. All material properties of working gas are assumed velocity coupling scheme proposed by Lebon et al. [12] is
constants because only small temperature difference exists in a employed to handle density variation in compressible gas.
LTDSE. The working gas is air and assumed to be ideal. Finally,
the effects of mechanical friction, thermal radiation, and viscous 4. Results and discussion
dissipation are neglected. Therefore, the engine cycle can be gov-
erned by three-dimensional transient laminar and compressible Kato [13] reported an experimental study on a c-type LTDSE
Navier-Stokes equations together with energy equation and ideal which is not equipped with a regenerator and uses flat plates as
gas equation as follows: heat exchangers. The engine configuration is therefore very similar
1006 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013
to current LTDSE, and the results include some measured indicated
diagrams (p-V diagrams) which are ideal for code validation pur-
pose. A case titled 90C in Kato [13] has been selected for code
validation. A validation test case has been setup using the engine
dimensions and operation conditions of Katos engine. Details
regarding engine dimensions and operational conditions of this
test case will not be given here, and readers are advised to refer
to Kato [13] for more information. The comparison between mea-
surements and current CFD results is given in Fig. 3. As seen, the
CFD results are in good agreement with the data. The values of
indicated work determined by experiment and CFD are 4.64 mJ
and 5.41 mJ, respectively, that is, CFD only overestimates indicated
work by 16.59%. The present code has also been validated via a the-
oretical adiabatic compression process where the p-V relation fol-
lows pV 1:4 C (C is a constant). Details of the second validation
have been reported in Chen et al. [7] and will not be repeated here.
Those geometrical parameters investigated in this study are
phase angle between power piston and displacer /, gap width
between displacer and displacer cylinder d = R2-Rd, length of dis-
placer ld, and length of power piston linkage bar l1. The last one
is meant to investigate the effects of dead volume. In terms of oper-
ation parameters, temperature difference between hot and cold
ends is fixed at 100 K while the cold-end temperature is fixed at
293 K, and engine rotational speed is fixed at 12.566 rads1
except that a different value of 6.283 rads1 is also specified for
the group of cases to examine effects of /. A negative rotation
speed signifies that the crank of this engine is running clockwise.
In the following subsections, as the dimension of a particular geo-
metrical parameter is changed, dimensions of the rest of geometri-
cal parameters take the values of a baseline case. Table 2 lists the
values of the above parameters in all cases examined in this study.
Among them, case 7 is the baseline case (in bold numbers).
The procedure to find proper mesh size and time-step interval
to obtain grid and time-step independent solutions for the baseline
engine has been performed and reported in Chen et al. [7], and
again will not be repeated here. Nevertheless, the conclusion was
that a grid and time-step independent solution can be achieved
by using a mesh (shown in Fig. 2) with 84,579 cells and 200 time
steps in a cycle. However, the present study involves parameters
of displacer length and power cylinder length. Hence, two compu-
tations have been conducted using cases 18 and 20 in Table 2,
Fig. 3. Comparison of p-V diagrams between the measurements by Kato [12] and
the current CFD approach.
where 50% more cells have been inserted to the displacer section
and power cylinder section, respectively. The finer meshes return
almost identical values of engines indicated work and efficiency
with those obtained by the current mesh, proving the current mesh
is adequate for the present parametric study. Therefore, the mesh
and number of time steps per cycle are adopted for all cases. Since
the methodologies and governing equations of CFD and those of
the first-, second-, or third models are very different, it is not very
meaningful to compare the results by CFD and other models quan-
titatively. In the following, results obtained by the current study
only compared with other studies that use first-, second-, or third
models qualitatively.
4.1. The effects of phase angle /
Phase angle / is the difference between the rotational angles of
power piston and displacer. A value of 90 is commonly adopted by
LTDSEs, that is, displacer moves ahead of power piston by 90.
Although the effects of this parameter have been studied by some
zero- or one-dimensional methods (for example in [14]), they have
not been analyzed in detail by CFD in open literature. A change in /
produces a time shift on the variations of physical quantities over
an engine cycle, but this parameter has little effect on the magni-
tude of compression ratio Vr. The reason is because in the current
engine, the radius of displacer rod (1.5 mm) is very small compared
with the radius of displacer cylinder (40 mm). The cross-section
area ratio between displacer rod and displacer cylinder is only
0.0014, hence the motion of displace rod only changes very slightly
the value of compression ratio. This group of cases serves as a good
example to demonstrate that a parameter hardly affecting com-
pression ratio could still produce significant impacts on engine
performance.
Cases 110 form this group of test cases. Among them, the
phase angle ranges from 70 to 120 in two different rotational
speeds, x = 6.283 and 12.566 rads1. Rotational speed is an
operational parameter but a geometrical parameter. The purpose
of running this group in two rotational speeds is to demonstrate
that the tendency of the variations produced by changing a geo-
metrical parameter remains more or less the same under different
operation conditions.
Fig. 4 shows the p-V diagram of x = 12.566 and / = 80, 100,
and 120, respectively. It is noticeable that the values of maximum
and minimum engine volume are the same for all cases (because Vr
remains the same) but an increase in / results in an increase in the
difference between maximum and minimum pressures. However,
even the difference in pressure has increased, the p-V loop seems
to become slenderer, suggesting that indicated work does not nec-
essarily increase with /. The reasons for these phenomena are
intriguing, and can be explained through motions of displacer
and power piston and variations of overall heat transfer rates in
expansion and compression chambers. Fig. 5(a) shows the varia-
tions of overall heat transfer rates in expansion and compression
chambers for / = 80, 100, and 120, while Fig. 5(b) depicts the
temperature contours at h = 86.4 for / = 80 and 120. Note that
in Fig. 5(a) the horizontal-axis is h, which marks the direction to
the right corresponding to the increase in time. It can be seen from
Fig. 5(a) that as / increases, profiles of overall heat transfer rate
shift to the left. This, in fact, means that all heat transfer events,
heating in the expansion chamber and cooling in the compression
chamber, happen earlier. The phenomenon is readily understood
because heat transfer events are basically driven by the motion
of displacer. As displacer moves ahead in time, so do these events.
Fig. 5(b) shows a moment during engine compression process
when engine volume almost reaches its minimum, that is, near
the end of engine compression process or the beginning of engines
expansion process. The relative positions between power piston
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013 1007

Table 2
The values of parameters investigated in the current study.

Case No. / () ld (m) d (mm) l1 (m) x (rads1) Vr

1 70 0.073 1.000 0.085 6.283 1.247
2 80 0.073 1.000 0.085 6.283 1.247
3 90 0.073 1.000 0.085 6.283 1.247
4 100 0.073 1.000 0.085 6.283 1.247
5 110 0.073 1.000 0.085 6.283 1.247
6 80 0.073 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.247
7 90 0.073 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.247
8 100 0.073 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.247
9 110 0.073 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.247
10 120 0.073 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.247
11 90 0.073 0.875 0.085 12.566 1.250
12 90 0.073 1.125 0.085 12.566 1.243
13 90 0.073 1.250 0.085 12.566 1.240
14 90 0.073 1.375 0.085 12.566 1.237
15 90 0.073 1.500 0.085 12.566 1.234
16 90 0.068 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.249
17 90 0.078 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.245
18 90 0.083 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.243
19 90 0.088 1.000 0.085 12.566 1.241
20 90 0.073 1.000 0.065 12.566 1.219
21 90 0.073 1.000 0.070 12.566 1.226
22 90 0.073 1.000 0.075 12.566 1.233
23 90 0.073 1.000 0.080 12.566 1.240

expansion process is just about to start. Since positive work on

the p-V diagram only created during engines expansion process,
the heat energy to sustain higher pressure to deliver more work
begins to decline right at the starting point of the expansion pro-
cess. This results in a rapid decline in pressure and the ability to
produce more positive work on the p-V diagram. To this end, it
has been demonstrated that an increase in / gives rise to both pos-
itive and negative effects on indicated work. The real impact of this
parameter on engine performance can only be realized through its
effect on engine indicated power and efficiency.
The rates of heat input and output during an engine cycle are
calculated by integrating local heat transfer rate along all solid
boundaries:
Z tt o t p Z
x
Q in qdAdt ; if q > 0; 17
2p tt 0 wall

Z tt o t p Z
x
Q out qdAdt; if q < 0; 18
2p tt0 wall

where q is local heat transfer rate. Since in a c-type Stirling engine

Fig. 4. p-V diagram of three cases with different phase angles, / = 80, 100, and
120, and x = 12.566 rads1.
and displacer can be clearly seen in this plot. By referring to the
heat-transfer-rate profile in the expansion chamber shown in
Fig. 5(a), the overall heat transfer rate of / = 120 almost reaches
its maximum at this moment. This is mainly due to the impinging
jets in the expansion chamber shown in Fig. 5(b). In this case, the
heating process coincides very well with engines compression
process (when pressure increases). Since both heating and engine
compression can increase working gas pressure, their effects are
mutually intensified, resulting in highest maximum pressure
shown in Fig. 4. On contrary, the coincidence of these two pro-
cesses is not so well in the case of / = 80, hence its maximum
pressure is smaller. Similarly, the reason for the case with
/ = 120 producing the lowest minimum pressure is due to well
coincidence of the cooling process and engines expansion process.
However, if the heating process is synchronized well with engines
compression process, heating has begun to diminish as engines
the movement of displacer poses no effect on engine volume, the
engine can be considered as a cylinder-piston system in which
the indicated work is the area circled by the p-V loop on a p-V dia-
gram. Alternatively, indicated work can be evaluated by integrating
the work done by the power piston, and then the indicated power is
calculated by:
I Z 
_  x
W pdA dx3 ; 19
2p piston
where the negative sign on the right hand side of the equation is to
compensate negative x, and the circular integration is from mini-
mum xp3 to maximum xp3 and back to minimum xp3 . The maximum
difference in the average pressures of the expansion and compres-
sion chambers is less than 30 Pa for all cases (listed in Table 2)
examined in this study. Such a magnitude so insignificant compared
with the variation in absolute pressure which is in the order of 104.
Therefore, effect of this pressure difference is neglected in the eval-
uation of indicated power. The ratio between indicated power and
rate of heat input is cycle efficiency g. In the following, g will be just
termed efficiency. Fig. 6 illustrates the variations of engine
1008 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013

Fig. 6. Variations of engine power and efficiency versus /.

10.67%. Overall, / = 90 is the best choice considering engines indi-

cated work and efficiency. This result supports the commonly
adopted practice of using / = 90 in LTDSEs.

4.2. The effects of gap width d

Case 7 and cases 1115 are in this group of test cases; and
among them, gap width d varies from 0.875 mm to 1.5 mm. Two
major effects can be produced by widening d. First, the engine vol-
ume inside displacer cylinder is slightly increase, resulting in a
decrease in compression ratio (see Table 2). Second, as the gap
becomes wider, it reduces the velocity of working gas flowing
through the gap channel. Fig. 7 illustrates the p-V diagram of cases
with d = 1.0 mm, 1.25 mm, and 1.5 mm. The increase in engine vol-
ume due to the widened gap width can be clearly seen from the
right shift of p-V loop as d increases. Meanwhile, the difference
between maximum and minimum pressures has decreased. As a
result, the p-V loop of the case with d = 1.5 mm circles the smallest
area thus yields the least indicated work among the three cases. On

Fig. 5. Variations of overall heat transfer rates and temperature contours; (a)
variations of overall heat transfer rates in three cases with different phase angles,
/ = 80, 100, and 120, and x = 12.566 rads1, (b) temperature contours with
/ = 80, 100 at h = 86.4.

indicated power and efficiency versus /. It is noticeable that ten-

dencies in curves of indicated power and efficiency resulted by dif-
ferent engine speeds are indeed very similar. Therefore, discussion
will be focused on the curves produced by the higher engine speed.
The variations in indicated power show that indicated power is not
very sensitive to changes in /. The maximum and minimum values
within the range from / = 80 to 100 are 0.647 W and 0.602 W,
respectively; that is, the variation in indicated power is within 7%.
This implies that the positive and negative effects on indicated work
discussed earlier have more or less cancelled each other. Neverthe-
less, it still can be seen that the maximum indicated power occurs
around / = 100. Efficiency, on the other hand, is a bit more sensi-
tive to changes in /. The maximum efficiency of 4.87% occurs at
/ = 90, whereas the minimum efficiency of 4.35% occurs at / Fig. 7. p-V diagram of three cases with different gap widths, d = 1.0 mm, 1.25 mm,
= 120; that is, the variation in efficiency in this range is within and 1.5 mm.
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013
the other hand, the case with d = 1.0 mm produces the largest indi-
cated work. The beneficial effect on indicated work in the latter
case can be attributed to the combination of the increase in Vr
and some changes in heat transfer behaviors due to smaller d.
The positive effect of increasing Vr needs no further elaboration,
whereas the changes in heat transfer behaviors and their effects
will be discussed in the following. Fig. 8 shows the velocity vectors
and temperature contours in the expansion chamber at h = 100.8
for cases with d = 1.0 mm and 1.5 mm. Fig. 9(a) shows the corre-
sponding local heat transfer rate distributions on the bottom plate
(hot end), and Fig. 9(b) gives the variations of overall heat transfer
rate in the expansion and compression chambers over an engine
cycle. The moment h = 100.8 is in the so called injection phase
when cold working gas has been injected into the expansion cham-
ber through the gap channel, creating the maximum rate of heat
transfer in the expansion chamber. From the velocity vectors in
Fig. 8(a), it can be seen that in the case of d = 1.0 mm, jet enters
the expansion chamber at higher velocity and creates a stronger
impinging jet to impinge on the bottom plate. Under this circum-
stance, impingement heat transfer, which is the dominant heat
transfer mechanism, should be largely promoted. This can be ver-
ified from the distributions of local heat transfer rate in Fig. 9(a)
Fig. 8. Velocity vector and temperature fields in the expansion chamber of cases with d = 1.0 mm and 1.5 mm at h = 100.8.
1009
where the jet impingement region is seen to produce the largest
local heat transfer rate, and the magnitude in case with
d = 1.0 mm is much larger than that in the other case. However,
the magnitude of the local heat transfer rate is not much larger
elsewhere on the bottom plate. The reason is due to another heat
transfer mechanism in the gap where a narrower gap also intro-
duces another beneficial effect which can be seen from the temper-
ature contours in Fig. 8(b). The narrower the gap, the closer the
working gas is to the displacer cylinder wall; and the better the
heat transfer between gas and displacer cylinder wall. Hence, the
jet is seen to exit the gap channel and enter the expansion chamber
at higher temperature in the case with d = 1.0 mm. Then the higher
jet temperature slightly offsets the impingement heat transfer
because the temperature difference between working gas and bot-
tom plate becomes smaller. Fig. 9(b) confirms that in the expansion
chamber, the case with d = 1.0 mm has the highest overall heat
transfer rate in a short period around at h = 100.8, however,
the magnitude of this quantity drops faster than other cases after-
wards. This is because that more effective heat-transfer mecha-
nism heats up the temperature of working gas to a higher level,
thus reducing the temperature difference between working gas
and bottom plate and resulting in faster reduction in overall heat
1010 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013

Fig. 9. Distributions of local heat transfer rate on the bottom plate and variations of overall heat transfer rates; (a) local heat transfer rate distributions of cases with
d = 1.0 mm and 1.5 mm at h = 100.8, (b) variations of overall heat transfer rates in three cases with d = 1.0 mm and 1.5 mm.

transfer rate. Now the reason for the higher maximum pressure in
the case with d = 1.0 mm shown in Fig. 7 can be readily understood.
It is the result of the combined effects of higher expansion chamber
temperature and higher compression ratio. A narrower gap also
introduces similar heat transfer behaviors in the compression
chamber. However, the effects are to reduce the compression
chamber temperature and yield lower minimum pressure.
Fig. 10 depicts the variations of engine indicated power and effi-
ciency versus d. Both indicated power and efficiency decrease as d
increases. However, engine indicated power appears to be more
sensitive to the change in d. By reducing d from 1.5 mm to
0.875 mm, engines indicated power increases by 32.03%, whereas,
efficiency only increases by 5.87%. The reason is due to a stronger
dependence of p-V loop on d shown in Fig. 7. Since narrowing the
gap d can simultaneously increase heat input and work output, effi-
ciency is only slightly improved as d decreases. Overall, engines
indicated power and efficiency have been improved as d decreases.
The results in Cheng and Yu [5], where a second-order method has
been used to study a b-type Stirling engine, also showed decreases
in output work and efficiency as d increases from 0.0003 m to
0.0009 m. In reality, however, d cannot be very small because the
displacer can easily scratch the wall of displacer cylinder and cre-
ate wear and friction if d becomes too small.
4.3. The effects of displacer length ld
Case 7 and cases 1619 are in this group of test cases. Displacer
length ld varies from 0.068 m to 0.088 m among these cases. Here,
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013 1011

Fig. 10. Variations of engine power and efficiency versus d.

as ld increases, so does the length of displacer cylinder (lc1-lc2)

because the displacer is housed inside the displacer cylinder. The
longer the ld, the longer the distance between the hot and cold ends
of the engine, and the longer the length of gap. Hence, a longer ld
introduces two beneficial effects. First, engines hot and cold ends
become more separated, thus heat loss due to conduction in dis-
placer cylinder wall is less. Second, an elongated gap promotes
heat transfer between gas and displacer cylinder wall. However,
a longer displacer also means a heavier displacer to move (more
mechanical friction) and larger pressure drop as working gas is
shuttled between expansion and compression chambers through
a longer gap channel. Since conduction heat loss and mechanical
friction are not modeled in the governing equations, the effects
on them due to the change in ld will not be examined in this study.
Fig. 11 shows the p-V diagram of cases with ld = 0.068 m,
0.078 m, and 0.088 m, while Fig. 12 shows the variations of average
temperature and overall rate of heat transfer in the expansion and
compression chambers. As ld increases, the volume in displacer

Fig. 12. Variations of averaged temperature and overall heat transfer rate in
expansion and compression chambers of three cases with different displace lengths,
ld = 0.068 m, 0.078 m, and 0.088 m; (a) temperature variations, (b) overall heat
transfer rate variations.

cylinder slightly increases, for example from 2:0285  104 m3 to

Fig. 11. p-V diagram of three cases with different displace lengths, ld = 0.068 m,
0.078 m, and 0.088 m.
2:0782  104 m3 as ld increases from 0.068 m to 0.088 m. Such a
volume increase causes a slight decrease in compression ratio;
from 1.249 to 1.241 in the same range of ld. This reflects on the
right shift of p-V loop in Fig. 11. Although compression ratio
decreases, the maximum pressure seems to drop very little. The
reason can be seen from the average temperature variations in
Fig. 12(a) where temperature level in the expansion chamber is
shown to increase as ld increases. Thus higher gas temperature
compensates the enlargement in volume and keeps the maximum
pressure from dropping. As a result, the p-V loop of ld = 0.088 m cir-
cles the largest area. Such a positive effect is rooted in better heat
transfer effect due to a longer gap channel. Therefore it acts like a
thermal barrier between the expansion and compression chamber
1012 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013

to keep temperature in the expansion chamber high and tempera-

ture in the compression chamber low. Hence less heat input is
needed at the hot end, and engine efficiency can be improved.
The overall heat transfer rate shown in Fig. 12(b) confirms that
there is less heat transfer in the case of ld = 0.088 m. Fig. 13 shows
the variations of indicated power and efficiency versus ld. Both
quantities increase almost linearly as ld increases. Between the
cases with largest and smallest ld, the magnitude of improvement
on indicated power and efficiency are 10.08% and 13.83%,
respectively.

4.4. The effects of dead volume

The effects of dead volume have been studied by many zero- or

one-dimensional models, for example in Abdullah et al. [15]. It is
generally recognized that an increase in dead volume reduces
engine indicated power. In a real Stirling engine, the magnitude
of dead volume is determined by many geometrical parameters.
Here, the parameter of l1, which is the length of power piston link-
age bar, is selected to examine the effects of dead volume. This is
inspired by the observation shown in Fig. 14 that some commercial
LTDSEs are designed to leave a significant gap between the power
piston and the bottom of power-piston cylinder when the power
piston is at its bottom dead center (BDC). This gap creates a dead
volume which could hamper engine performance. Case 7 and cases
2023 are in this group of test cases, and among them, l1 ranges
from 0.065 m to 0.085 m. As l1 increases, dead volume decreases, Fig. 14. A commercial LTDSE showing the existence of a significant gap between
and compression ratio increases. The p-V loops of cases with power piston and bottom of power cylinder when power piston is at its BDC.
l1 = 0.065 m, 0.075 m, and 0.085 m are shown in Fig. 15. Among
them, the compression ratio increases from 1.219 for l1 = 0.065 m
to 1.247 for l1 = 0.085 m. A significant shift of p-V loop to the left
can be observed as l1 increases. The maximum volume decreases
from 2.17398  104 m3 to 1.9780  104 m3. Meanwhile, the
maximum pressure also increases from 133574 Pa to 136986 Pa,
implying that more indicated work can be produced. Since the
dimensions associated with displacer and displacer cylinder
remains the same, there is very little change in heat transfer
behaviors. Consequently, the variations in temperature and overall
heat transfer rate in expansion and compression chambers are very
similar among those cases in this group. Therefore, the increase in
maximum pressure can be attributed to the increase in compres-
sion ratio. In Chen et al. [9], engines indicated work and efficiency
increase almost linearly with an increase in compression ratio.
Therefore, an increase in compression ratio caused by increasing

Fig. 15. p-V diagram of three cases with different l1 lengths, l1 = 0.065 m, 0.075 m,
and 0.085 m.

l1 is expected to have similar effects on engines indicated work

Fig. 13. Variations of engine power and efficiency versus ld.
and efficiency. The effect of l1 on engines indicated power and effi-
ciency can be seen in Fig. 16. Both engines indicated power and
efficiency increase as l1 increases (dead volume decrease). The
magnitudes of improvement are 11.03% and 10.18% for indicated
power and efficiency, respectively from the case with
l1 = 0.065 m to the case with l1 = 0.085 m. The results clearly show
that reducing dead volume is beneficial to engine performance.
Similar conclusion also can be found in Cheng and Yang [14],
where a second-order model is used to optimize the geometrical
parameters of b- and c-type engines.
To help readers understand the effects of each parameter on
current LTDSE, four videos comparing temperature contours
 W.-L. Chen / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 107 (2017) 10021013
Fig. 16. Variations of engine power and efficiency versus l1.
produced by different parameter values within two engine cycles
are provided.
5. Conclusions
The effects of some geometrical parameters, phase angle
between power piston and displacer, gap width between displacer
and displacer cylinder, length of displacer, and length of power pis-
ton linkage bar, on the performance of a c-type LTDSE have been
investigated using an in-house CFD code. These parameters cause
little effect on the magnitude of compression ratio, yet they can
post significant impacts on the overall engine performance. CFD
returns detailed temperature and velocity fields at every time step
over an engine cycle, allowing the key physical processes that are
influential on engine performance to be examined. Hence, through
what mechanisms and to what extent that a parameter affecting
engine performance can be identified and studied. The results are
presented using p-V diagrams, temperature contours and local heat
transfer rate distributions at some particular moments, variations
of averaged temperature and heat transfer rates in expansion and
compression chambers, and variations of engines indicated power
and efficiency versus these parameters. Conclusions drawn from
the current study are:
1. Operation parameter, in this case the engine speed, is shown to
affect the variations caused by a geometrical parameter quanti-
tatively but qualitatively.
2. Phase angle / has little effect on the magnitude of compression
ratio, but has been shown to be very influential on engine per-
formance, especially on efficiency. An increase in / shifts
engines heat transfer events forwards in time, thus affecting
the level of coincidence between the heat transfer process and
engines expansion and compression process. / = 100 has been
found to yield the maximum indicated power, but / = 90 is a
better chose considering the overall engine performance.
3. Gap width d between displacer and displacer cylinder is an
important parameter on engine performance. Narrowing the
gap width promotes impingement heat transfer as well as heat
transfer effect in the gap. As a result, engines indicated power
and efficiency are both improved as d becomes smaller, and
the effect of d on indicated power is more pronounced that that
on efficiency. This tendency agrees with what has been
observed in Cheng and Yu [5].
1013
4. The length of displacer ld poses a direct impact on heat transfer
effect in the gap. The longer the length of displacer, the better
the heat transfer between gas and displacer cylinder wall.
Hence, both engines indicated power and efficiency are found
to increase almost linearly with an increase in ld. In practice,
however, a displacer cannot be too long because it would
become heavy and result in an increase in mechanical friction.
5. Engines heat transfer behaviors are not sensitive to an increase
in the dead volume caused by decreasing l1, but engines com-
pression ratio will be reduced, resulting in a reduction in indi-
cated power. Overall, an increase in dead volume only
introduces negative effect on engine performance. The conclu-
sion agrees with that reported in Cheng and Yang [14]. Engi-
neers should reduce dead volume as much as possible when
designing a new LTDSE.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Tech-
nology, Taiwan, Republic of China, under the grant number MOST
103-2622-E-168-006-CC3. The authors are very grateful for the
financial support.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found, in
the online version, at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstrans-
fer.2016.11.007.
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