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Performance improvement potentials of R1234yf

mobile air conditioning system

Zhaogang Qi*
Institute of Refrigeration and Cryogenics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, No. 800, Dongchuan Road,
Shanghai 200240, PR China

article info abstract

Article history: In this paper, the performance improvement potentials of R1234yf mobile air conditioning
Received 13 December 2014 (MAC) system under various operation conditions were studied based on thermodynamic
Received in revised form cycle analysis. The effects of superheat at evaporator outlet, subcooling at condenser outlet
16 March 2015 and compressor efficiencies on system performance were analyzed. It was found that
Accepted 17 March 2015 superheat was few benefits for both system coefficient of performance (COP) and cooling
Available online 24 March 2015 capacity. Increasing subcooling from 1K to 10K at condenser outlet, system cooling ca-
pacity and COP could be improved by 15% if compressor consumption power was fixed. The
Keywords: isentropic efficiency of the compressor was a key factor in system COP improvement. It
R1234yf was concluded that adding an internal heat exchanger and improving compressor effi-
Improvement potential ciencies would be good options for the future R1234yf MAC system enhancement.
Superheat 2015 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.
Subcooling
Compressor efficiency

lioration des performances de syste

Potentiels d'ame  me de
conditionnement d'air mobile fonctionnant avec le R1234yf
Mots-cl
es : R1234yf ; Potentiel dame

lioration ; Surchauffe ; Sous-refroidissement ; Efficacite

du compresseur

in all vehicles in Europe from 2017 (Environment Committee,

1. Introduction
The car manufacturers are encountering more and more
pressures from the legislature not only on energy consump-
tion but also on environmental concern. The most urgent
issue for mobile air conditioning (MAC) industry is to find the
suitable alternative refrigerant for R134a which will be banned
2006). For that requirement, there are several candidates
such as CO2 (Lorentzen, 1994), R152a (Ghodbane, 1999),
R1234yf and so on. So far, R1234yf is showing a promising
future in MAC systems and attracting more attentions by the
industry and academic because its thermal and physical
properties are very similar with R134a (Akasaka et al., 2010). In
order to improve R1234yf system performance to approach

* Tel.: 86 21 34206259; fax: 86 21 34206814.

E-mail address: qizhaogang@sjtu.edu.cn.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijrefrig.2015.03.019
0140-7007/ 2015 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.
36 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 5 8 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 3 5 e4 0

and COP were lower than that of R134a system. The

Nomenclature compressor volumetric efficiency of R1234yf was about 5%
lower because of higher frictional pressure drop in suction
COP coefficient of performance ()
tubes. An internal heat exchanger could improve system
Disp compressor displacement (m3 rev1)
COP and cooling capacity significantly comparing with
h enthalpy (kJ kg1)
R134a system in a drop-in experimental study (Navarro-
m_ mass flow rate (kg s1)
Esbr et al., 2013b). Wang (2014) did a comprehensive liter-
Q cooling capacity (kW)
ature review on R1234yf and its system application and
RPM compressor speed (rev min1)
pointed out some future research topics on R1234yf perfor-
W consumption power (kW)
mance enhancement.
Greek letters In this paper, the R1234yf MAC system performance
r density (kg m3) improvement potentials would be discussed based on the
h efficiency () simplified thermodynamic cycle analysis. The effect of su-
perheat at evaporator outlet, subcooling at condenser outlet
subscripts
and compressor performance on system COP and cooling ca-
1,2,20 ,3,4 state points
pacity would be mainly focused.
comp compressor
evap evaporator
isen isentropic
vol volumetric
2. MAC thermodynamic cycle analysis

2.1. Basic MAC cycle

R134a system, many researches were conducted in the fun-
damentals and system applications.
In general, mobile air conditioning system is a vapor
Many researchers' results concluded that evaporation heat
compression cycle driven by engine through clutch or electric
transfer coefficient of R1234yf is approximately the same as
motor. The simplified thermodynamic cycle was shown as
that of R134a (Park and Jung, 2010; Saitoh et al., 2011; Lu et al.,
Fig. 1 which was composed of four processes. There were
2013). Col et al. (2010) and Longo's and Zilio's (2013) experi-
some assumptions in the cycle as the following:
mental result revealed that the condensation heat transfer
coefficient of R1234yf was lower than that of R134a by 12~35%
 The superheat at evaporator outlet and subcooling at
depending on the test conditions and heat exchanger. Wang
condenser outlet were 5K if it was not a variable,
(2013) summarized the recent research advances on the two-
respectively.
phase heat transfer characteristics of R1234yf including in-
 The pressure drops in evaporator, condenser and connec-
tube convective boiling and in-tube condensation. For the
tion tubes were ignored.
evaporator and condenser in MAC system, the overall thermal
 The throttle process in expansion valve was isenthalpic.
resistance is dominated by air side. On these basis, redesign
 The compressor had a constant displacement
and performance improvement of MACs heat exchangers
(120  106m3 rev1).
could be easier in the next step.
 The compressor efficiencies changed with vehicle opera-
Mathur (2010a; 2010b; 2011a; 2011b) performed a thor-
tion conditions.
ough R1234yf drop-in experiments in R134a MAC system.
The parallel flow condenser, laminated plate evaporator and
internal heat exchanger were selected for the system coef-
ficient of performance (COP) and cooling capacity compen-
sation. Zilio et al. (2011) carried out a numerical simulation
on R1234yf MAC system. The simulation results showed
that if condenser and evaporator heat transfer area could be
augmented by 20% and 10% respectively, R1234yf system
could show a better COP than the baseline R134a system at
the same cooling capacity. Lee's and Jung's (2012) experi-
mental results showed COP and cooling capacity of R1234yf
MAC system were lower by 0.8~2.7% and up to 4.0% than
that of R134a system with tube-in-tube condenser and
evaporator, respectively. Qi (2013) experimentally studied
the performance differences in laminated plate evaporator
and minichannel evaporator using R134a and R1234yf as
working fluid. The test results showed that minichannel
tube parallel flow evaporator was a good option in R1234yf
drop-in replacement. Navarro-Esbr et al. (2013a) set up an
R1234yf MAC system for hybrid electric vehicle. The Fig. 1 e R1234yf basic thermodynamic cycle in logPeh
experimental data showed that both cooling capacity diagram.
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 5 8 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 3 5 e4 0 37

Table 1 e MAC operation conditions.

Idle City High speed
Condenser air side 35  C 40  C 45  C
temperature
Compressor RPM: 800 RPM: 1800 RPM: 3000
rpm, hisen rpm, hisen rpm, hisen
and hvol:0.75 and hvol:0.65 and hvol:0.55

Table 2 e Variables in the present study.

Variables (Unit) Range
Superheat (K) 1~10
Subcooling (K) 1~10
Compressor volumetric efficiency () 0.55~0.95
Compressor isentropic efficiency () 0.55~0.95

 The evaporation temperature was constant (5  C) for all Fig. 2 e The effect of superheat on system performance and
vehicle operation conditions and the temperature differ- COP under idle condition.
ence between condensation and ambient air was constant
(20K).
previous assumptions, evaporation temperature was constant
 The above parameters could be a variable during the
although operation conditions changed and the condensation
following analysis.
temperature would change with air temperature at condenser
outside. In the present study, the superheat, subcooling and
The cooling capacity, compressor consumption power,
compressor performance would be set as variables as shown
system COP and refrigerant mass flow rate were calculated by
in Table 2. But only one of them was a variable at one time and
Eqs. (1)e(4):
the others were kept constant under the specific operation
Qevap m_  h1  h4 (1) condition.

Wcomp m_  h2'  h1 =hisen (2)

Qevap
COP
Wcomp
RPM
m_  Dispcomp  r1  hvol
60
All the above equations and calculations were carried out
using Engineering Equation Solver (EES, F-Chart Software,
2014). The thermodynamic properties of R1234yf and R134a
were from the data provided by Richter et al. (2011) and
Tillner-Roth and Baehr (1994), respectively.
2.2. Vehicle operation conditions and analysis variables
MAC system can operate under a wide range ambient condi-
tions. Three typical ambient and operation conditions were
selected as idle (low ambient air temperature), city (moderate
ambient air temperature) and high speed (high ambient air
temperature) conditions shown in Table 1(Qi, 2008). As the
3. Results and discussion
(3)
The theoretical R1234yf system performance was compared
with that of R134a system as shown in Table 3. It was implied
that both system COP and cooling capacity of R1234yf system
(4)
were smaller than that of R134a for all the vehicle operation
conditions. The gap ranges of system COP, cooling capacity
and compressor consumption power were 4.8~7.0%, 7.7~10.6%
and 3.1~3.8%, respectively. The following discussions were
explained from the effect of superheat, subcooling and
compressor performance on the system performance
improvement potentials.
3.1. Effect of superheat and subcooling
During the calculation, the subcooling and compressor per-
formance were fixed when superheat was changed. As shown
in Fig. 2 and Fig. 3, superheat has little influence on system
performance. The system COP and cooling capacity were only

Table 3 e R1234yf and R134a MAC System performances under three typical conditions.
Idle City High speed
R1234yf R134a Deviation (%) R1234yf R134a Deviation (%) R1234yf R134a Deviation (%)
Qevap(kW) 2.488 2.696 7.7 4.503 4.952 9.1 5.852 6.544 10.6
Wcomp (kW) 0.802 0.828 3.1 1.946 2.015 3.4 3.466 3.604 3.8
COP() 3.100 3.257 4.8 2.314 2.457 5.8 1.689 1.816 7.0
38 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 5 8 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 3 5 e4 0
Fig. 3 e The effect of superheat on compressor power and
refrigerant mass flow rate under idle condition.
increased by 2.6% and 3.7% with the superheat increasing
from 1K to 10K, respectively. It was shown in Fig. 2 that it
would be almost impossible for R1234yf system to reach the
same COP and cooling capacity only by increasing superheat
comparing with that of R134a system. The increasing super-
heat reduced the refrigerant mass flow slightly with the fixed
compressor efficiencies and state points because of lower
vapor density with higher refrigerant vapor temperature as
shown in Fig. 3. On the other hand, R1234yf system needs
higher refrigerant mass flow because of smaller latent heat
(Akasaka et al., 2010). Higher superheat also would bring a
potential deterioration to compressor discharge temperature
and lubricant oil.
A suitable subcooling at condenser outlet will guarantee
the liquid state at expansion valve inlet and a proper refrig-
erant quality at evaporator inlet. The COP and cooling capacity
were increased by 15.0% with subcooling increasing from 1K
Fig. 4 e The effect of subcooling on system performance
and COP under city condition.
Fig. 5 e The effect of subcooling on compressor power and
refrigerant quality at evaporator inlet under city condition.
to 10K if the compressor power was fixed as shown in Fig. 4
under city condition. Comparing to R134a system, it would
be possible to approach the same system COP and cooling
capacity with subcooling increasing. For example, R1234yf
system with 7K subcooling almost had the same COP (2.4) as
R134a system with 3K subcooling. R1234yf system with 10K
subcooling almost had the same cooling capacity (4.8 kW) as
R134a system with 3K subcooling.
Refrigerant quality at evaporator inlet was decreased with
subcooling increasing from 1K to 10K which would result in a
larger enthalpy difference in evaporator as Fig. 5. It seemed
that 10K subcooling was not sufficient because the quality was
still a little large (0.39). More subcooling was needed and then
placing an internal heat exchanger at evaporator outlet and
condenser outlet would be a good option to compensate the
performance decline (Mathur, 2011a; Cho et al., 2013).
Fig. 6 e The effect of compressor volumetric efficiency on
system COP and cooling capacity under high speed
condition.
 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 5 8 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 3 5 e4 0
Fig. 7 e The effect of compressor volumetric efficiency on
compressor power and refrigerant mass flow rate under
high speed condition.
Fig. 8 e The effect of compressor isentropic efficiency on
system COP and cooling capacity under high speed
condition.
3.2. Effect of compressor efficiency
The compressor plays a key role in mechanical vapor
compression refrigeration system performance improvement.
The effect of compressor volumetric efficiency (hvol) on MAC
system performance improvement was shown in Fig. 6 and
Fig. 7 when the other MAC cycle state points were constant.
From these figures, system COP was constant since the
compressor consumption power and cooling capacity
increased with refrigerant mass flow rate at the same level.
Obviously, increasing the mass flow rate was an easy way to
improve the system cooling capacity based on the thermo-
dynamic cycle analysis. R1234yf system could reach the same
cooling capacity (~6.5 kW) as R134a system by improving
compressor volumetric efficiency (hvol) from 0.55 to 0.62 under
high speed condition. Based on the theoretical analysis,
39
Fig. 9 e The effect of compressor isentropic efficiency on
compressor power under high speed condition.
R1234yf system cooling capacity could be improved by 72.8% if
compressor volumetric efficiency (hvol) was increased from
0.55 to 0.95. It should point out that a higher mass flow rate
would result in higher pressure drop in compressor which was
worse for compressor consumption power (Navarro-Esbr
et al., 2013a).
On the other hand, if compressor isentropic efficiency
(hisen) was increased, system cooling capacity would be con-
stant when the compressor volumetric efficiency and cycle
state points were constant as shown in Fig. 8. The benefit from
compressor isentropic efficiency (hisen) improvements was the
system COP increasing which resulted from the compressor
consumption power reduction. Under high speed condition,
R1234yf system COP could be lifted to the same level as R134a
system when compressor isentropic efficiency (hisen) was
increased from 0.55 to 0.59. From the theoretical analysis,
R1234yf system COP could be improved by 72.7% if compressor
isentropic efficiency (hisen) was increased from 0.55 to 0.95. The
biggest gain from compressor isentropic efficiency (hisen)
improvement was compressor consumption reduction as
shown in Fig. 9.
4. Conclusions
In this paper, the thermodynamic analysis for R1234yf mobile
air condition system was performed association with R134a
system under three typical vehicle operation conditions. The
performance improvement potentials by superheat, subcool-
ing and compressor performance were mainly focused and
discussed.
The analysis results revealed that the R1234yf system COP
and cooling capacity were lower by 4.8~7.0% and 7.7~10.6%
than that of R134a system under all three conditions (idle, city
and high speed), respectively. Increasing subcooling tempera-
ture from 1K to 10K could improve system COP and cooling
capacity by 15.0%. And the effect of superheat on COP and
cooling capacity was tiny and was adverse for larger refrigerant
mass flow rate. R1234yf system cooling capacity could increase
40 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 5 8 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 3 5 e4 0
by 72.8% with compressor volumetric efficiency (hvol) from 0.55
to 0.95 if the other compressor efficiency and state points were
fixed. On the other hand, compressor isentropic efficiency
(hisen) improvement could reduce the power consumption
dramatically which resulted in system COP increasing. It was
concluded that adding an internal heat exchanger and
improving compressor efficiency would be better options in the
future R1234yf MAC system enhancement.
Acknowledgments
The author is very grateful for the financial support from the
National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.
51406113).
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