Surge Tank Multi-Chamber Design for Coolant De-aeration
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Solution Overview
Problem
Modern truck engines face challenges in de-aerating coolant due to high fluid flow rates, which leads to cavitation, engine overheating, and poor de-aeration efficiency, especially with plastic surge tanks that tend to soften and increase foaming at high temperatures.
Innovation Solution
The design incorporates a series of chambers at the fluid inlets to regulate coolant flow, reduce turbulence, and optimize air and liquid separation, using plastic or polymer materials with specific geometries and reinforcements to minimize foaming and enhance de-aeration, allowing for efficient air bubble removal and coolant expansion.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If high fluid flow rates are used in surge tanks, then cooling efficiency is improved, but de-aeration performance deteriorates due to cavitation and microbubble formation
Solution Approach 1:
The surge tank is divided into multiple chambers (first chamber, second chamber, third chamber) separated by baffles. This segmentation allows the tank to handle high flow rates while providing multiple separation zones for air bubbles, maintaining de-aeration performance despite high productivity requirements.
Solution Approach 2:
Baffles act as intermediary structures between the inlet and outlet chambers. These baffles create controlled flow paths that reduce turbulence and provide air-liquid separation interfaces, mediating between the high flow rate requirement and the de-aeration requirement.
2Ease of manufacture
If plastic surge tanks are used for weight and cost savings, then manufacturing cost is reduced, but structural stability deteriorates at high temperatures
Solution Approach 1:
The surge tank uses a composite structure combining plastic material with internal metal reinforcements (baffles and ribs). This composite approach maintains the weight and cost advantages of plastic while the metal reinforcements provide the structural stability needed to withstand high temperatures and pressure differentials.
Solution Approach 2:
Metal reinforcements are strategically placed in specific locations (baffles separating chambers, ribs for structural support) rather than making the entire tank metal. This local reinforcement approach provides structural stability where needed while maintaining the overall cost and weight benefits of plastic construction.
3Strength
If reinforcing baffles are added to plastic surge tanks, then structural strength is improved, but foaming increases due to high coolant flow rates impacting the baffles
Solution Approach 1:
The baffle design incorporates specific geometric parameters (opening sizes, baffle heights, chamber volumes) that are optimized to change the flow characteristics. These parameter changes allow the baffles to provide structural support while creating flow conditions that minimize foaming and air bubble entrainment.
4Volume of moving object
If surge tank size is reduced for compactness, then vehicle space utilization is improved, but de-aeration efficiency deteriorates due to insufficient air bubble separation volume
Solution Approach 1:
The compact surge tank is segmented into multiple functional chambers (air separation chamber, water separation chamber, outlet chamber) that perform different de-aeration functions. This segmentation allows efficient use of limited volume while maintaining effective air bubble separation through multiple staged separation processes.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This design improves de-aeration efficiency, reduces the size of surge tanks, and makes them insensitive to varying engine flow rates, eliminating the need for vent hoses and simplifying vent line routing, while maintaining effective coolant system pressure regulation and expansion capabilities.
Implementation Method 1
Air is removed from the coolant as it passes through the surge tank
Implementation Method 2
A need exists for improved surge tank designs and related methods... regulate coolant flow, reduce turbulence
Data Source
AI summary
A surge tank comprises a liquid inlet portion designed to dissipate the energy of coolant flowing into the surge tank. Desirably, fluid is delivered into a pool of liquid in an initial chamber rather than into an air gap above a pool of liquid such that the pool of liquid assists in dissipating energy of the entering coolant. Coolant from the last of a series of initial chambers desirably exits in a manner that reduces the distance air bubbles must rise to separate from the coolant. Also, when coolant flows from one initial chamber to at least one other initial chamber, desirably the direction of flow of at least a major volume of the coolant is changed, such as by locating an outlet passage from one chamber at a lower portion thereof and the passage from a subsequent chamber at an upper portion thereof. Passageways between the various chambers may be of a progressively increasing total cross-sectional area to assist in reducing the velocity of fluid flow from one chamber to the next. Also, in desirable embodiments, substantially laminar coolant flow is achieved prior to passage of coolant from an exiting chamber into a primary coolant receiving section of the surge tank.