Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

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Journal of Energy Storage

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

Research Papers

Experimental investigation of PCM melting with graphite/aluminum alloy

“sandwich” plate of high thermal conductivity
Zihan Ju , Dinghua Hu *, Qiang Li , Ershuai Yin
MIIT Key Laboratory of Thermal Control of Electronic Equipment, School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Science & Technology, Nanjing
210094, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: This work proposed the “sandwich” structure of the graphite/aluminum alloy high thermal conductivity plate.
Paraffin The study is focused on the heat dissipation effect of graphite/aluminum alloy “sandwich” plate (GASP) in the
Phase change heat storage phase change heat storage heat sink. Firstly, the equivalent thermal conductivity of the GASP was measured
Graphite/aluminum alloy sandwich plate
experimentally. Then melting experiments were performed with heating powers of 15 W, 20 W, and 30 W in the
High thermal conductivity
cavity with pure paraffin, aluminum alloy plate, and GASP. Phase and temperature field visualization are
Phase change material
observed by the digital camera and infrared thermal imager combined with thermocouples at the vertical-mid
plane inside the cavity, respectively. Visualized images revealed that the existence of the GASP dominates the
melting direction of the paraffin perpendicular to the plate and shortens the melting distance of the paraffin. Melt
fractions, absorbed energy, and Nusselt numbers can be obtained from experimental data based on the melting
process. Furthermore, the melting enhancement ratio was defined and thermal control performance was
investigated. Experiment results indicated that adding GASP increased the melting rate and decreased the
melting time. The melting enhancement ratio decreased with raising the heating power which indicates GASP is
more effective at lower heat flux. Meanwhile, the positive optimization of increasing heat transfer area on
melting exceeds the negative effect of decreased Nusselt number.

in phase change heat storage. Three methods are mainly developed to

1. Introduction enhance the thermal conductivity of PCM: One is to add high thermal
conductivity metal nanoparticles, carbon nanotubes, and other high
In recent years, with the development of electronic equipment to­ thermal conductivity micro-nano materials to paraffin to enhance heat
wards high power and high integration, the heat flux density of elec­ conductivity [10–12]; The second is to combine paraffin with high
tronic devices has become higher and higher [1,2]. Temperature plays thermal conductivity porous structural materials, such as metal foam,
an important role in the performance of electronic devices. According to expanded graphite, etc. [13–15]; The third is to add high thermal con­
the US report, 55 % of electronic device failures are caused by excessive ductivity metal fins to paraffin, such as flat aluminum fins, needle fins,
temperature [3]. Compared with active air-cooled [4] and water-cooled etc. [16–18].
[5,6] heat dissipation technologies, the latent heat storage technology of S. Kalaiselvam et al. [19] studied the heat transfer performance of
solid-liquid phase change materials is widely applied in the thermal phase change using spherical encapsulated phase change materials
control performance of heat sinks with less resources [7], intermittent containing six different forms of nanoparticles. The changes in melting
and pulsed electronics [8], owing to its great heat storage capacity and rate, phase interface, and temperature distribution during solidification
almost constant heat storage and release processes. were analyzed experimentally. The results show that PCM containing
Paraffin wax is widely used as a phase change material due to its high nanoparticles has a faster melting rate than pure PCM. However, the
latent heat, stable performance, non-corrosion, and non-toxicity. How­ solidification rate decreases with the rise of nanoparticle mass fraction;
ever, the disadvantage of PCM is the poor thermal conductivity (0.2–0.3 Sadegn Motahar et al. [20] used mesoporous silica (MPSiO2) nano­
W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1), which seriously reduces the efficiency of phase change particles as thermal conductive media to disperse in n-octadecane.
heat storage and limits its application range [9]. Therefore, it is the Novel phase change materials with mass fractions of 1 wt%, 3 wt%, and
current research hotspot to improve the thermal conductivity of paraffin 5 wt% MPSiO2 were prepared. The maximum thermal conductivity of

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: [email protected] (D. Hu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.est.2023.109953
Received 26 June 2023; Received in revised form 21 October 2023; Accepted 2 December 2023
Available online 14 December 2023
2352-152X/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

Nomenclature Tm1 Onset of melting temperature [◦ C]

Tm2 Endset of melting temperature [◦ C]
A Cross-sectional area of GASP [m2] Tmean Mean temperature [◦ C]
Aw Total heat transfer area [m2] Tw Hot wall temperature [◦ C]
Cp Specific heat [J⋅kg− 1⋅K− 1] V Volume [m3]
d Distance between test points [m] Vc Volume of cavity [m3]
h Surface average heat transfer coefficient [W⋅m− 2⋅K− 1] W Width of cavity [m]
hsl Latent heat [kJ/kg]
Greek symbols
H Height of cavity [m]
ρ Density [kg⋅m− 3]
k Thermal conductivity [W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1]
γ Melt fraction
L Length of cavity [m]
Nu Average Nusselt number Subscripts
Q Heat transfer rate [W] i Initial
Qtotal Total absorbed energy [kJ] l Liquid
Qsensible Sensible absorbed energy [kJ] s Solid
t Time [s]
Tm Melting temperature [◦ C]

the high phase change material with 5 wt% mass fraction can be dimensionless parameters are formulated to achieve the highest heat
increased by 6 % and the thermal conductivity of solid phase does not storage performance. By comparing the results with those of other re­
increase monotonously with the increase of MPSiO2 particles. Based on searchers, it is determined that the optimal length ratio of fins to heat
nanoparticle research reinforced heat conduction of pure PCM, Hon­ storage is 0.75, and the optimal width ratio of fin spacing to heat storage
gyang Li et al. [21] have investigated the melting performance of Al2O3 is 0.35. Muhammad Shahid Shafiq et al. [27] studied a symmetrical
nanoparticles on metal foam high PCM. It is found that metal foam will rectangular heat storage unit with double heating walls. Six horizontal
weaken the heat convection so that proper nanoparticles that have large fins are arranged on each heating wall. Fin lengths of linear, quadratic,
porosity can be added to pure PCM or the MFCPCM. cubic, and exponential functions are used to optimize the melting rate
In addition to the high thermal conductivity micro-nano materials and heat storage performance of PCM. At the same time, the fin structure
mentioned above, metal foam and fins have attracted more research due is further optimized for different aspect ratios of the shell. The study
to their excellent rigid structure, convenient machining, and good shows that the exponential fin structure has the best performance
thermal conductivity. Xusheng Hua et al. [22] designed a visual exper­ because it can cause strong convection. In addition, the optimum length-
iment to research the thermal behavior of metal foam PCM high phase width ratio of 0.5 and the optimum fin thickness of 1.5 mm were
change materials. The melting process and temperature distribution of determined.
PCM with and without metal foam were observed clearly. The effective It is clearly observed that embedding metal foam and inserting metal
thermal conductivity of high phase change materials was also calculated fins are effective approaches to enhance the thermal control perfor­
by numerical simulation. It indicated that metal foam can significantly mance of PCM. However, as the heat flow density and integration of
enhance the effective thermal conductivity and the melting rate of PCM. electronic equipment become higher and higher, the demand for heat
The maximum temperature difference is decreased by 83.3 % and the storage reinforced structures of lightweight and high conductivity is
melting time of high PCM by 45 %. Yuanpeng Yao et al. [23] also becoming more and more urgent. At present, the thermal conductivity of
visualized the heat transfer process of open-cell metal foam/paraffin copper metal foams used widely is only 397 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1. Although
highs (MFPC) and monitored the temperature changes at the key posi­ graphite has excellent thermal conductivity (the horizontal heat con­
tions inside MFPC. It was indicated that the different structures of metal duction of graphite sheet is as high as 1600 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1), it is restricted
foam caused different interface shapes and melting rates by influencing to becoming heat conduction plates due to the disadvantages of low
thermal diffusion and convection. The temperature uniformity of strength and high brittleness. In response to the demand, Yixin Chen
paraffin wax is improved by reducing the porosity and pore density and [28] performed a quantitative analysis on the thermal conductivity of
the local thermal imbalance is improved. Not limited to metal foam, annealed pyrolytic graphite (APG) and the heat dissipation effect in the
Soroush Ebadi et al. [24] proposed the application of two different APG/aluminum alloy integrated component. The result shows that the
porosity (75 % and 87 %) to heat storage systems. The result shows that APG/aluminum alloy integrated component of heat dissipation and
the temperature inside the storage system is more uniform when the load-bearing, which not only reduces the weight but also improves the
copper wire mesh is embedded in the phase change material, especially heat dissipation capacity. However, there is no research on the heat
at low porosity. Meanwhile, the charging time can be reduced by 24 % to storage effect of APG/aluminum alloy integrated structure in paraffin
the maximum extent when the copper wire mesh with 75 % porosity is phase change materials.
used. Besides, the heat transfer rate and the total stored energy have Therefore, the measurement of equivalent thermal conductivity and
significantly enhanced owing to the high thermal conductivity of the PCM melting experiment with graphite/aluminum alloy sandwich plate
copper wire mesh. were carried out in this work. The proposed graphite/aluminum alloy
Babak Kamkari et al. [25] carried out melting experiments in a sandwich plate is simply named “GASP” in the rest of the full text. The
transparent rectangular cavity with or without the addition of horizontal paper provides visual images of the melting process in rectangular
fins when the wall temperatures were 55, 60, and 70 ◦ C. The phenom­ cavities with pure paraffin, aluminum alloy plate, and GASP of high
enon of thermal stratification was observed by visualization and thermal conductivity, which demonstrates the significant impact pro­
measured temperature and the melting enhancement ratio and total fin duced by natural convection on the melting process and the influence of
efficiency were defined as melting parameters. The experimental results adding GASP on the paraffin melting rate. The results of the experi­
indicate that partial fins have a greater effect on melting at the initial mental investigation are helpful to fundamentally understand the
stage. Abdelghani Laouer et al. [26] mainly investigated the effect of fin melting direction of the paraffin perpendicular to GASP and quantify the
length and position on the phase change process in heat storage. Two high thermal conductivity effectiveness of GASP, providing a new entry

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

point for the optimization of the structure and performance on phase horizontal direction. The experiment usually takes 7 min to make the
change heat storage. test section reach a steady state. In the process of reaching a steady state,
all temperatures of TC are recorded by a digital data logger (Agilent
2. Experimental apparatus and procedure 34972A), and then the equivalent thermal conductivity of GASP can be
gained by
2.1. Graphite/aluminum alloy “sandwich” plate of high thermal
Q
conductivity λ= (1)
A ΔT
Δd

2.1.1. The structure of graphite/aluminum alloy sandwich plate

where Q is the heat transfer rate; A is the cross-sectional area of GASP;
The ‘sandwich’ structure of GASP with high thermal conductivity is
ΔT and Δd are the temperature difference and distance between test
shown in Fig. 1. The structure of GASP is to fix the graphite sheet in the
points across the test section.
aluminum alloy frame, and then encapsulate the graphite with an
In this paper, the temperature of different positions in the vertical
aluminum plate. The graphite and aluminum plates are combined
plane of GASP was measured meanwhile. Fig. 6 describes that the
tightly by diffusion welding and other processes [28]. The total thick­
relative temperature difference at different positions on the side is less
ness of GASP is 3.5 mm, the thickness of the graphite sheet is 1.9 mm,
than 2.9 %, so the heat transfer in the vertical direction can be ignored,
and the thickness of the upper and lower aluminum alloy plates is 0.8
which ensures the one-dimensional heat transfer in the horizontal di­
mm. The width of the frame around the graphite sheet interlayer is 5
rection through the test section. According to this experimental method,
mm. The aluminum alloy plate is made of 5A06-type aluminum alloy,
the thermal conductivity error of a pure aluminum alloy plate is less
which has good tensile strength and thermal conductivity (117
than 6.8 %. The error is allowed in the measurement of thermal con­
W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1). The internal high-conductivity material adopts annealed
ductivity, so this experimental device is effective.
pyrolytic graphite with a thermal conductivity of 1600 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1 in
the in-plane direction and a thermal conductivity of 10 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1
perpendicular to the in-plane direction. 2.2. Description of the PCM melting experimental setup
Therefore, the graphite/aluminum alloy sandwich plate not only has
the high thermal conductivity of graphite in the horizontal direction but In the experiment, paraffin with 99 % purity was selected as PCM,
also makes up for the shortcomings of brittleness and low vertical which has beneficial properties such as non-toxicity, excellent chemical
thermal conductivity of graphite, which makes GASP has the charac­ stability, and suitable phase transition temperature. Fig. 3 displays the
teristics of high thermal conductivity, lightweight and good strength. DSC heating thermogram of PCM, where the onset melting point of PCM
is the junction of the tangent at the maximum slope point of the DSC
2.1.2. Measurement of equivalent thermal conductivity of GASP peak and the baseline, and the latent heat value of phase change can be
As depicted in Fig. 2(a), the steady-state method [29] was used to obtained by integrating the area under the peak of DSC curve numeri­
measure the equivalent thermal conductivity of GASP in this work. The cally [30]. Its thermal property parameters are shown in Table 1.
GASP is sandwiched between the heat source and water cooling plate to The phase change heat storage unit is a rectangular cavity with in­
form the test section. A stable temperature difference was maintained ternal dimensions of 128 mm length, 82 mm width, and 25 mm depth.
between the front and rear of the GASP to establish one-dimensional As shown in Fig. 4, the ceramic heater is installed on the left wall of the
heat conduction in the test section. cavity as a constant heat source, and the left wall is made of aluminum
Fig. 2(b) displayed the experimental setup based on the above test alloy with a thickness of 3 mm. In order to measure the temperature of
method. Two ceramic heaters with the size of 81 × 10 mm are used as the heat source during the melting process, four thermocouples are
heat sources and installed at the upper and lower sides of the top of the placed in holes about 1 mm below the heat surface. The thermocouples
test section. Two water cooling plates of size 81 × 40 mm are set up at were fixed in the hole with glue. A thermal conductive silicone pad with
the bottom of the test section to provide a cold sink. The ceramic heater a thermal conductivity of 13 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1 is used to reduce the thermal
is supplied with 30 W power by DC power supply. The water cooling contact resistance between the heat source and the left wall. The other
plate connected to the water tank is regulated to be around 20 ◦ C to walls of the cavity are made of 5 mm thick transparent acrylic plates for
obtain a steady state environment across the test section. Nine calibrated visual observation during the experiment. The PCM container is insu­
thermocouples are attached to the upper surface of the test sample lated with glass wool. Twelve thermocouples were placed at the vertical
(shown in Fig. 2(a)) to measure the surface temperatures. The whole test median plane in the heat storage device to measure the transient tem­
section is wrapped with cotton glass to ensure good heat insulation and perature distribution.
the heat passing through the test section is one-dimensional in the Fig. 5 describes the arrangement of thermocouples in the cavity. The
four rows of thermocouples are correctly fixed in small grooves on the

Fig. 1. The structure of GASP.

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

Fig. 2. Test section and experiment setup.

heat storage device was wrapped with insulating cotton. Then the
electric power switch (affording three different heating powers) is
turned on, and at the same time, the data acquisition system and TC used
to measure temperature are started.
To study the visualization of the melting process, the insulation
cotton wrapping the shell was removed every 10 min and photographs.
Meanwhile, the temperature at the designated position inside the PCM
was recorded every 10 s. The experiment will continue until the
completed melting of the solid PCM is observed. Three series of melting
experiments were carried out with 15, 20, and 30 W heating power
respectively to investigate the effect of different heating powers on the
thermal behavior of PCM. The experiment at each power was conducted
three times to verify the repeatability of the experiment. It was found
that the experiment had good repeatability and the deviation can be
negligible.

2.4. Experimental uncertainty

Errors and the uncertainty of measuring instruments always happen

in the experimental measurement, which influences the uncertainty of
Fig. 3. DSC heating thermogram of paraffin. the experiment. The present uncertainties of the experiment mainly
consist of temperature measurement, TC installation position, dimen­
sion of thermally conductive plates, the mass of paraffin, and heating
Table 1 powers. For the whole temperature measurement system composed of K-
Thermophysical properties of paraffin. type TCs (TT-K-36) and Agilent 34972A data acquisition system. The
Specific heat capacity solid/liquid (kJ/kg⋅K) 1.8 uncertainty calibrated is estimated to be ±0.2 ◦ C. The maximum size
Melting temperature range (◦ C) 51.28–64.8 uncertainty of the thermal conductivity plate is estimated to be 0.02
Latent heat of fusion (kJ/kg) 192
mm, which is caused by the processing and measurement uncertainty.
Thermal conductivity solid/liquid (W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1) 0.22/0.17
Density solid/liquid (kg/m3) 910/880 According to the specification limit of the electronic balance, the esti­
mated uncertainty for the paraffin mass is ±0.1 g. The uncertainty of
heating power is mainly due to the accuracy of the DC power supply.
straight rod made of silicone rubber respectively, then are put into the During the heating process, the resistance of the heater will change with
paraffin inside the cavity. All thermocouples with an accuracy of the temperature, resulting in an error of 4.1 % in the heating power. The
±0.2 ◦ C are initially calibrated and record the temperature every 10 s by above measurement uncertainties are summarized in Table 2 for
connecting to the computer via a data logger. A digital camera and reference.
infrared camera placed in front of the test section are used to observe the
phase change process of paraffin every 10 min. 3. Results and discussions

2.3. Experimental procedure 3.1. Experimental results for the equivalent thermal conductivity

Solid PCM was melted in a high-temperature drying oven and Fig. 7 shows the temperature change measured on three rows of
injected into the cavity layer by layer to make sure each layer of paraffin thermocouples over time. It can be seen that the test section of GASP has
was solidified. It should be ensured that the total amount of paraffin in established a one-dimensional temperature steady state until 450 s. The
the cavity containing an aluminum alloy plate or GASP is consistent with equivalent thermal conductivity of GASP is 954 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1 based on
that in the cavity with pure paraffin. The air conditioner was used to Fourier's law of heat conduction in Eq. (1). The comparison of the
reach the initial temperature of the experiment (25 ◦ C) and the entire thermal conductivities between GASP and its component materials is

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

Fig. 4. Experiment setup.

Fig. 5. Arrangements of thermocouples in the cavity: (a) pure paraffin; (b) with
aluminum alloy plate or GASP.

Fig. 7. Temperature change measured on three rows of thermocouples

over time.

summarized in Table 3.

3.2. Solid-liquid interface evolution

The melting mechanism of paraffin and the heat transfer enhance­

ment effect of GASP can be displayed by the visualization of the solid-
liquid instantaneous interface. Fig. 8 shows the photographs of the
melting process with pure paraffin, aluminum alloy plate, and GASP at
different times when the power of the heating surface on the left is 20 W.
In these photographs, the solid and liquid phases of the PCM are pre­
sented in white and black colors, respectively.
Fig. 8(a) presents the melting process of pure paraffin in the cavity
without heat conduction-enhanced structures. Initially, the solid-liquid
interface of the melted paraffin only forms a small inclination angle
Fig. 6. Verification of one-dimensional thermal conductivity. with the heated wall on the left, indicating that melting is incompletely
dominated by heat conduction within the thin liquid layer at this time.
As time passes, the buoyancy generated by the melted paraffin over­
comes the viscous force, resulting in natural convection in the liquid
phase. Therefore, the produced convection causes the serious tilt of the

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Fig. 8. Photographs of the melting process every 10 min with a heating power of 20 W.

(a) Pure paraffin (b) Aluminum alloy plate (c) GASP

Fig. 9. Photographs of the melting process at 50 min with different heating powers.

solid-liquid interface. With the evolution of melting, natural convection resulting in the vortex generated by natural convection being small.
continues to strengthen. It can be proved by the visualization that the While the paraffin above the aluminum alloy plate gains heat from the
length of the melt front has become longer and has an obvious effect on plate below, the melted paraffin rises to the top of the cavity and pro­
the melting progress. However, by the end of 6000 s melting time, there duces a strong vortex due to buoyancy. So that the upper natural con­
is still 19.69 % of the paraffin that has not completely melted. vection is stronger and the melting rate is faster than the lower half. As
Fig. 8(b) illustrates the melting process with an aluminum alloy plate time flows, heat transfers along the aluminum alloy plate, and the
added in the middle of the cavity. Natural convection played a major paraffin phase transformation region continues to expand backward,
role in the melting of paraffin during the early time, the radians of the leading to a longer melting distance.
melting front below and above the aluminum alloy plate are similar, Fig. 8(c) shows the melting process with GASP in the cavity. In the
indicating similar buoyancy circulating driven by natural convection early stage of melting, the melting front of the paraffin with GASP was
exists in both halves of the cavity. However, the melting rate above the similar to that with the aluminum alloy plate, indicating that they were
aluminum alloy plate has increased significantly compared to the lower both affected by natural convection. However, due to the high thermal
part of the cavity. Taking the 1800 s situation for example, it can be seen conductivity of GASP (954 W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1), the heat generated by the heat
that the paraffin below the aluminum alloy plate gains heat from above, source is quickly transferred along the plate. The natural convection of

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Fig. 10. Infrared images of the melting process every 10 min with a heating power of 20 W.

paraffin using GASP is stronger than that using the aluminum alloy 3.3. Temperature distribution
plate, causing a greater difference in the melting rate of paraffin above
and below GASP, and the entire cavity also has a higher melting rate. It The infrared images can well correspond to the temperature distri­
is worth noting that a thin phase change layer is gradually formed on bution of phase images at different moments to compensate for the
both sides of the GASP after melting for 2400 s. With the increase of limitations of visual observation. Fig. 10 illustrates the evolution of
time, the heat is transferred from the GASP to the upper and lower sides, temperature contours in the cavity with pure paraffin, aluminum alloy
forming an obvious melting front that is approximately parallel to the plate, and GASP while the heating power is 20 W. Fig. 10(a) displays the
plate. This differs significantly from that using an aluminum alloy plate, transient temperature field of the melting process in the cavity with pure
as GASP exhibits not only a melting process along the plate direction but paraffin. During the pre-melting phase, the liquid PCM is driven up
also a melting response perpendicular to the plate direction. The exis­ along the heating wall by natural convection, where it keeps gaining
tence of the GASP dominates the melting direction of the paraffin heat and reaches its highest temperature at the top of the cavity. At this
perpendicular to the plate, which not only shortens the melting distance time, the temperature gradient of the liquid paraffin area is much higher
of paraffin but also improves the overall space heat transfer perfor­ than that of the solid paraffin area. Meanwhile, the hot liquid PCM de­
mance. This results in the most uniform melting of paraffin in the whole flects towards the solid-liquid interface, forming a clearly inclined
cavity. melting front. Furthermore, liquid paraffin superheats rapidly to a large
Fig. 9 shows the solid-liquid interface at 50 min in the cavity with extent due to its low thermal conductivity and small specific heat
pure paraffin, aluminum alloy plate, and GASP with different heating capacity.
powers of 15, 20, and 30 W. When the heating power is 20 W, the Fig. 10(b) and (c) depicts the temperature distribution change in the
paraffin with GASP presents a distinct melting layer parallel to the plate, cavity containing the aluminum alloy plate and GASP. For both adding
while the paraffin above the GASP has completely melted due to aluminum alloy plate and GASP, the high-temperature region first fo­
enhanced thermal conductivity at 30 W. It can be seen that with the cuses on the upper left of the thermal conductivity plate, which extends
heating power increasing, the melting process will be accelerated and into a sloping area and along the thermal conductivity plate with time. It
the guiding effect of the GASP on the melting direction of the paraffin indicates the existence of a buoyancy-driven vortex on the upper and
will be promoted. lower surfaces of the plate. When the melting is carried out for 1200 s, it

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Fig. 11. Temperature history of thermocouples (T1–T8) at the heating power of 20 W.

can be observed in the temperature distribution of Fig. 10(c) that heat the surrounding paraffin.
has already been transferred throughout the entire GASP. However, the
heat transfer on the aluminum alloy plate has not yet begun in Fig. 10
(b), this will result in significant overheating of the heat source with an 3.4. Temperature histories
aluminum plate, far surpassing the temperature of the heat source using
GASP. This is because the high thermal conductivity of GASP can rapidly The specific information on the temperature and flow characteristics
transfer heat from the heat source along the plate to the paraffin, pre­ in the paraffin can be further understood through the temperature
venting heat accumulation on the hot wall and reducing the temperature change information recorded by the thermocouples. Fig. 11 shows the
rise of the heat source. temperature change curves of thermocouples located at the first two
At the 1800 s mark of the melting process, it is evident that heat on columns (T1–T8) in the cavity with pure paraffin, aluminum alloy plate,
the GASP is starting to propagate vertically upwards and downwards, and GASP while the heating power is 20 W.
while the heat on the aluminum alloy plate has not yet reached the rear For all the above cases, when the temperature in the cavity is lower
side of the plate. This confirms that GASP dominates the vertical melting than the paraffin melting point (58 ◦ C), the heat generated by the heat
direction after 1800 s, which is consistent with the solid-liquid melting source is mainly transmitted to the paraffin through solid conduction.
interface. After that, the melting trend in Fig. 10(b) continues to grad­ For the cavity with pure paraffin (Fig. 11(a)), the initial temperature rise
ually extend from left to right, while a different trend of gradually rate of the first column thermocouples is significantly higher than that of
decreasing temperature distribution from the GASP to both sides is the second column, revealing that the heat conduction rate is higher in
observed in Fig. 10(c). The GASP transfers heat to the upper and lower the initial stage of the experiment. In the case of using the aluminum
sides obviously so that the heat transfer path of the entire cavity has alloy plate and GASP (Fig. 11(b) and (c)), the initial temperature rise
become shorter and the temperature gradient becomes smaller. It causes rate of the thermocouples (T3–T8) is higher than that in the cavity with
a more uniform temperature distribution in the entire cavity and avoids pure paraffin. This is because of a higher heat transfer rate of the solid-
local paraffin overheating. liquid interface around the heat conduction-enhanced structures.
Until the paraffin with the GASP cavity is completely melted, the The temperature measurements based on pure paraffin are shown in
temperature is uniformly distributed throughout the cavity. After 6000 Fig. 11(a). Due to the extremely poor thermal conductivity of PCM and
s, the latent heat of the paraffin wax in the cavity with GASP has been the absence of thermally enhanced structures in the cavity, the heat
fully consumed. In contrast, the paraffin with the aluminum alloy plate cannot transfer to T1 until 5 min later. Then T1 rises very quickly in the
is still not completely melted. The temperature distribution in Fig. 10(b) following melting stages under the excessive accumulation of heat in
indicates that the heat transfer performance of the aluminum alloy plate liquid PCM. Afterward, the increasing rate of T1 decreased significantly,
is not prominent, exhibiting a smaller temperature gradient compared to indicating the forming of strong convection in liquid PCM, and the heat
transfer performance between the heating wall and paraffin was

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Fig. 12. Temperature history of thermocouples (T4, T5, T6, T7, T9 and T10).

Fig. 13. Comparison of the melt fraction variation versus time at 20 W.

Fig. 14. Total melting time of paraffin under different heating powers.

especially enhanced.
The temperature variation curves shown in Fig. 11(b) based on the in the latter at the same position is markedly lower than that of pure
measurement of TCs reveal that the thermal response rate has enhanced paraffin, since in the liquid region with an aluminum alloy plate, the
obviously in the cavity with aluminum alloy plate compared to that of heat transfer effect is better, and accumulated heat is less than that in
pure paraffin. The temperature rise rate of the liquid paraffin measured pure paraffin. Fig. 11(c) presents the paraffin temperature rise curves of
fixed position in paraffin with GASP. A faster thermal response speed

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Fig. 15. Comparison of melting enhancement rate between GASP and

aluminum alloy plate at 20 W. Fig. 17. Sensible, latent, and total absorbed energies by the thermal storage
unit at 20 W.

Fig. 16. Variation of the melting enhancement ratio with GASP at different
Fig. 18. Transient variation of surface averaged Nusselt number at 20 W.
heating powers.

can be seen, the average temperatures of the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th rows
and less heat accumulation were observed in the former part during
are 94.3, 92.7, 88.4, and 79.7 ◦ C, respectively. The temperature of the
melting compared to using an aluminum alloy plate. Since the high
upper two rows of thermocouples with the heat conduction plate is
thermal conductivity of GASP can quickly transfer heat from the source
close, the liquid is in a mixed state. While thermal delamination
and distribute it to the surrounding paraffin.
occurred in the lower half of the shell, which also can be observed in the
In above all cases, when the temperature of the thermocouples rises
temperature distribution in Fig. 10(c).
to the paraffin melting point, the temperature will continue to rise when
At the same time, as shown in Fig. 12(c), the temperature curve
the liquid PCM flows through the forefront of the thermocouples, indi­
changes of the following thermocouples also confirm the temperature
cating it still takes some time for heat to transfer from the solid-liquid
distribution mentioned above in the cavity. Due to the high thermal
interface to the edge of the thermal boundary layer.
conductivity of GASP, the heat is exported from the heat source and
Fig. 11(a) presents the temperature corresponding to the turning
transferred to GASP quickly, showing a temperature distribution that
point from rapid temperature rise to slow temperature rise, which de­
decreases from the GASP to the upper and lower sides. It can be seen that
creases from higher thermocouples to lower in each column. The reason
the temperature of T6 has a much faster rise than that of T5 in the early
for the downward trend in temperature at the edge of the thermal
time, indicating that the heat conducting enhancement effect of the heat
boundary layer is that the thermal boundary layer becomes thicker
conduction plate is more intense than the thermal effect produced by
when it flows downward along the interface. Table 4 lists the temper­
natural convection; At the same time, the mid-term temperature rise
ature of the liquid PCM with GASP after melting. It clearly shows the
rates of T4 are close to that of T5 and T6, which reveals that the GASP
proximity of the temperature of each row and the dropping trend of
reduces the thermal resistance between the heat source and the paraffin,
temperature from top to bottom to help watch thermal stratification. As
making the space heat transfer more uniform; Same phenomenon can be

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

paraffin. The melt fraction in the cavity with pure paraffin, aluminum
alloy plate, and GASP at the heating power of 20 W was compared in
Fig. 13. Obviously, adding heat conduction enhancement structures can
significantly increase the melting rate. The melting rate of PCM with
aluminum alloy plate and GASP is a little lower than that of pure paraffin
in the initial stage of melting since the addition of heat conduction
enhancement structures hinders the development of natural convection
and transfers heat to the rear cavity to avoid rapid heat accumulation.
When the melting time approaches 40 min, the accumulated heat in the
early stage due to thermal conductivity enhancement begins to cause a
large amount of phase transformation of paraffin in the cavity. There­
fore, the paraffin with GASP has a higher melting fraction compared to
aluminum alloy plates due to its efficient heat transfer capability.
Meanwhile, the melting growth rate of PCM with GASP reaches its peak
first in the mid-melting stage and enables it to facilitate faster and more
efficient heat transfer.
Fig. 14 illustrates the melting time of PCM in the cavity with pure
paraffin, aluminum alloy plate, and GASP at different heating powers. It
is clearly revealed that with the addition of reinforced structures with
higher thermal conductivity, the melting time is shorter. It's worth
Fig. 19. The maximum temperature of the heat source. noting that when the power is 15 W, 20 W, and 30 W, the melting time of
PCM with GASP accounts for about 75.8 %, 73.9 %, and 72.5 % of
melting time in pure paraffin, the melting time with aluminum alloy
Table 2 plate accounts for about 83.5 %, 82.6 %, and 81.3 %, indicating that
Summary of measurement uncertainties. heating power has little impact on the melting time ratio.
Measured parameters Uncertainty Relative uncertainty “Melting enhancement ratio” defined as the ratio of melting fraction
with heat conduction enhancement structures relative to the pure
Temperature measured by TC ±0.2 ◦ C –
Temperature measured by infrared ±0.7 ◦ C –
paraffin at the same moment [25], is introduced to evaluate the melting
camera enhancement effect. Fig. 15 presents the transient variation comparison
TC installation position ±1 mm 0.78 %, 1.22 %, 4 % of melting enhancement ratios between the aluminum alloy plate and
(length/width/height) GASP at 20 W. Both of them show a growth trend on the enhancement
Dimension of thermally conductive ±0.02 mm 0.02 %, 0.02 %, 0.57 %
ratio initially until reaches a maximum value and then begins to
plates (128 mm, 82 mm, 3.5 mm) (length/width/height)
Mass of paraffin (162 g) ±0.1 g 0.06 % decrease slowly. The growth trend of GASP is particularly sharp.
Mean heat flux density of heater (15/ ±0.62 W 4.1 %, 3.1 %, 2.1 % The initial sharp increase in melting enhancement ratio is due to the
20/30 W) transition from rapid heat transfer to natural convection around the heat
conduction enhancement structures. The high thermal conductivity
enables GASP to complete the transformation first and reach its peak,
Table 3 accelerating the melting rate compared to an aluminum alloy plate. The
Comparison of thermal conductivity between GASP and its component effect of GASP on the melting rate decreases quickly over time, which is
materials. attributed to the increased thickness of melted PCM and the decrease in
Materials Direction Thermal conductivity Thickness the intensity of convection. Fig. 16 displays the instantaneous variation
(W⋅m− 1⋅K− 1) (mm) of the melt enhancement ratio using GASP at different heating powers. It
In- Perpendicular can also be observed that the melting enhancement ratio of GASP at 15
plane and 30 W power also showed a similar trend to that at 20 W since the
5A06 aluminum Isotropic 117 0.8 × 2
heat transfer mechanism does not vary with the heat power. It is worth
alloy noting that the melting enhancement ratio of GASP decreases with the
Graphite sheet Anisotropy 1600 10 1.9 heating power increasing, indicating that the efficiency of the heat
GASP Anisotropy 954 – 3.5 conduction plate is higher at lower heat flux.

seen as following, the temperature of T10 in the third column also 3.6. Heat transfer characteristics
increased before T9, and the temperature rise rates of T7 are close that of
both above. The variation of Nusselt number over time can reflect the trans­
formation of the heat transfer mechanism during the melting progress of
3.5. PCM melting rate PCM in the cavity. The transient surface averaged Nusselt number can be
calculated as:
The time melting fraction can be used to evaluate the effect of using h(t)H
GASP on the melting progress of paraffin, which is defined as the ratio of Nu(t) = (2)
kl
the volume of melted liquid paraffin to the volume of initial solid

Table 4
Temperature of the liquid PCM with GASP.
1st row 2nd row 3rd row 4th row

T1 T5 T9 T2 T6 T10 T3 T7 T11 T4 T8 T12

Temperature ( C)◦
96.3 94.9 91.7 95.9 92.5 89.6 89.9 87.6 87.5 82.2 79.5 77.4

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

To account for the variable position of the melting front, the height of 3.7. Thermal control performance
the enclosure (H) was adopted as the characteristic length [31]. kl rep­
resents the thermal conductivity of liquid paraffin. Where h is the sur­ Tmax has a great impact on the operational reliability of devices such
face average heat transfer coefficient which can be expressed as: as high-power and highly integrated electronic devices. To further
investigate the thermal control performance of GASP, the instantaneous
Qtotal (t) maximum temperature (Tmax) of the heat source was obtained by the
h(t) = (3)
Aw (Tw − Tm )Δt thermocouple inserted below the heat source, which is depicted in
Fig. 19. It reveals that:
where Qtotal is the total heat absorbed by the PCM during this period
The Tmax increases when the heat source power increases, meanwhile
interval (Δt).
the temperature of the heat source is reduced effectively with the
Qtotal (t) = Qsensible (t) + ρl γ(t)Vc hsl (4) addition of heat conduction enhancement structures. Since GASP can
transfer the heat generated by the heat source to the PCM faster, and
Total sensible heat can be obtained as the following equation:
make the cavity melt more evenly, resulting in a lower temperature rise
(
∫ ∫ of the heat source compared to using the aluminum alloy plate. In this
Qsensible (t) = ρs cs (Tm1 − Ti )dVl + ρl cl Tmeanl (t) experiment, compared with using pure paraffin samples, the addition of
(5) the aluminum alloy plate and GASP can reduce the rise of Tmax to the
Vl (t) Vl (t)
) ∫
− Tm2 dVl + ρs cs (Tmeans (t) − Ti )dVs greatest extent at the heat power of 30 W, which is 19.1 % and 30.4 %
Vs(t) lower than that of pure paraffin on average.
In a word, pure paraffin without heat transfer reinforcement struc­
where Tmeanl (t) and Tmeans (t) represent the transient average tem­ tures has difficulty in keeping the heat source in a satisfying state, which
peratures of the liquid and solid phases, respectively. makes it difficult to meet the actual requirements of thermal control.
Aw is the total heat transfer area consistent of the hot wall and This is mainly because a large amount of heat can accumulate on the
thermally conductive plates calculated by: heating wall in the form of sensible heat, which causes significant nat­
Aw = (W × H) + 2 (L × W) (6) ural convection and uneven temperature fields, rather than stored in the
whole region as latent heat rapidly and uniformly. For successful ther­
Fig. 17 compares the growth trend of absorbed energy in the heat mal management applications, GASP is highly recommended because it
storage system at the heating power of 20 W. The effective thermal is effective in achieving fast and uniform latent heat storage in the phase
conductivity of PCM can be improved by the addition of GASP. There­ change unit and controlling the temperature, maintaining a lighter
fore, thermal energy will be stored in the heat storage system faster weight and reliable strength simultaneously.
compared to the case of using pure PCM and aluminum alloy plates. And
the stored energy value is higher at the same moment in the cavity with 4. Conclusions
GASP, since the stored energy is mainly determined by latent heat which
is a function of the volume of melted paraffin in a storage unit. There­ In this experiment, visualization and measurement of TCs are
fore, the melting rate of PCM with GASP is higher than that of pure implemented to investigate the effect of using GASP of high thermal
paraffin and aluminum alloy plates, which results in a higher energy conductivity on the melting progress of PCM in rectangular cavities. The
storage rate of the PCM storage unit. It also can be observed that the equivalent thermal conductivity of GASP was measured experimentally
maximum value of total absorbed energy of pure paraffin is slightly first. Then melting experiments were performed with pure paraffin,
higher after the paraffin melting, which is owning to the sensible heat aluminum alloy plate, and GASP at different heating powers of 15, 20,
gain brought by the higher temperature in the cavity. and 30 W.
Fig. 18 compares the transient variation of the average Nusselt
number on the inner surface of the cavity with pure paraffin, aluminum (1) Visualization during melting showed that natural convection
alloy plate, and GASP at a heating power of 20 W. For the above three currents played an important role in the melting process. It dis­
cases, the Nusselt number begins with a large initial value and then plays a significant melting enhancement with the addition of
shows a rapidly decreasing trend, indicating that the thickness of the GASP due to its high thermal conductivity. The melting direction
liquid PCM has been increasing under the condition of heat conduction. of paraffin with GASP is perpendicular to the plate which not only
As the melting of the paraffin wax progresses at this stage, the paraffin shortens the melting distance of the paraffin but also enhances
near the hot wall melts and gradually increases in temperature, causing the overall space heat transfer performance.
the viscosity of PCM to decrease and forming natural convection. Then (2) The temperature distribution has an overall transient shape and
the natural convection begins to dominate the middle-term melting position changes consistent with the solid-liquid phase interface.
process so that the Nusselt number reaches a relatively decline state. The temperature rise curve of the thermocouple indicates that
The Nusselt number starts to decrease smoothly at the later stage due paraffin with GASP has a faster thermal response speed and
to the weakness of natural convection and the increasing temperature of avoids heat accumulation. Temperature histories indicate that in
the liquid PCM. Besides, the surface average Nusselt number decreases the cavity with pure paraffin, the phenomenon of thermal strat­
with the addition of heat conduction enhancement structures to the ification gradually developed from the upper to the lower part of
cavity. This is due to hindering the convection perpendicular to the heat the cavity, while the layered area appears in the lower half of the
conduction plate, which leads to the reduction of flow intensity. plate for GASP.
Meanwhile, the decrease in the Nusselt number is a characteristic of the (3) The melting enhancement ratios of GASP increased to a
enhanced conduction state, hence the Nusselt number for GASP is lower maximum value and then gradually decreased. It also decreased
than that of aluminum alloy plate due to the high thermal conductivity with increasing heating power indicating the efficiency of GASP
and the smaller temperature gradient between GASP and the hot wall. is higher at lower heat flux. The addition of GASP increased the
However, as shown in Fig. 13, the PCM melting rate increases when the energy storage rate of PCM and decreased the surface-averaged
heat conduction enhancement structures are added because of the in­ Nusselt number. However, the positive optimization of
crease in heat transfer area. Therefore, it can be inferred that the positive increasing heat transfer area on melting exceeds the negative
optimization of increasing heat transfer area on melting exceeds the effect of decreasing Nusselt number. Using GASP also can
negative effect due to the decrease of the Nusselt number. improve thermal performance, leading to the temperature rise of
chips being 30.4 % lower than that of pure paraffin on average.

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Z. Ju et al. Journal of Energy Storage 77 (2024) 109953

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