Design methodology of a Mixed Refrigerant Joule-Thomson (MRJT) cryocooler

Abstract With the introduction of refrigerant mixtures in Joule-Thomson (JT) cryocoolers, its efficiency have increased by an order of magnitude. JT cryocoolers that use refrigerant mixtures instead of single refrigerants are called Mixed Refrigerant JT (MRJT) cryocoolers. The introduction of refrigerant mixtures makes MRJT cryocooler viable as an alternative to Stirling and Pulse tube cryocoolers, especially for small scale applications. Most of the studies on MRJT cryocoolers revolve around experimental investigation in order to achieve lowest possible temperature and optimisation of the-oretical performance of the cryocooler. While, these provide detailed performance and operating parameters, most of them lack an overall design methodology to design individual components of the MRJT cryocooler. In the present work a step by step design methodology is presented in order to design/choose the individual components of the MRJT. The study focusses on filling the gaps in the literature in in order to design the individual components such as the compressor, aftercooler, recuperative heat exchanger, capillary tube and the evaporator. The developed methodology is also validated with the experimental as well as theoretical obtained data.