Influence of the Nozzle-to-Surface Distance on Spray Cooling Efficiency

Spray cooling is a highly effective method of heat removal that has broad practical applications, including use in modern cooling systems designed for microelectronics and microchips. It is known that spray cooling performance is influenced by a huge number of factors. This experimental research is devoted to the study of the influence of a liquid flow rate in the range of 15.1–24.2 cm3/s, heat flux up to 6.4 MW/m2, and nozzle-to-surface distance on the heat transfer rate in non-boiling mode and the distribution of the local temperature of the heat exchange surface during spray cooling. It is shown that the heat transfer coefficient weakly depends on the heat flux for all studied nozzle-to-surface distances. It is demonstrated that the nozzle-to-surface distance has a significant influence on the heat transfer and the temperature distributionon the heating surface during spray cooling in non-boiling mode. At the same time, there is an optimal distance at which the maximum heat transfer rate and uniformity of the temperature are achieved. Criteria and a ratio for determining the optimal distance from the spray nozzle to the heated surface are proposed.