Cabin air conditioning system with liquid cooling for power electronics

This application relates to a cooling air ram that cools both working air for an air conditioning system, and also cools a liquid heat sink for cooling power electronics associated with an electric motor.

Aircraft air conditioning systems include a number of components. In a typical air conditioning system, a fan moves air to provide the heat sink for ground operation. The air passes through heat exchangers that are placed in a path of cooling air flow drawn by the fan. Thus, the fan draws air over a plurality of heat exchangers to cool the air being delivered to the several components.

More recently, high-powered electric motors are being used to drive various devices such as compressors and pumps for aircraft air conditioning systems. Power electronics controllers guide high current/voltage electrical power to an electric motor. These power electronics controls become quite hot during operation, and thus cooling is necessary. In general, to provide a separate cooling circuit for the power electronics would be undesirable.

In a disclosed embodiment of this invention, a heat exchanger for cooling fluid delivered to power electronics is cooled in the same ram as the air mentioned above. By utilizing a single cooling air ram, the present invention results in a simplified design, in which additional cooling air circuitry is not necessary.

In one disclosed embodiment of this invention, a cooling air ram is provided for cooling a plurality of air heat exchangers, and a liquid heat exchanger for cooling the power electronics.

In another embodiment, the cooling air ram is provided with a plurality of liquid cooling heat exchangers, and a plurality of air heat exchangers.

These and other features of the present invention can be best understood from the following specification and drawings, the following of which is a brief description.

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of a first embodiment.

FIG. 2 is a schematic view of a second embodiment.

An aircraft air conditioning system is shown schematically in FIG. 1 at 20 . A fan 22 is associated with a compressor 30 and turbine sections 32 . A cooling air ram is provided by fan 22 drawing air from an inlet 23 to a ram outlet 24 approaching the fan impeller. A check valve 26 allows the flow of additional air through the heat exchangers as necessary.

Air driven by the fan cools a primary heat exchanger 28 . Primary heat exchanger 28 cools a flow of air being delivered to the compressor 30 , and downstream as shown in the FIG. 1 schematic. A secondary heat exchanger 34 also cools air, with the air passing through the secondary heat exchanger flowing from the compressor 30 , and into a reheater/condenser 36 .

A recirculation air heat exchanger 38 also receives a flow of air, and passes the air to the cabin of an aircraft.

The present invention incorporates a liquid sink heat exchanger 40 into the ram and the array of heat exchangers between the inlet 23 and the ram outlet 24 . The liquid sink heat exchanger receives a cooling fluid, which is delivered to cool power electronics 42 for controlling an electric motor 43 . The function and structure of power electronics 42 , and the need for incorporating such for controlling a motor 43 is as known. Further, the concept of having to provide liquid cooling for such power electronics is generally known.

The present invention is the incorporation of a heat exchanger 40 for the cooling fluid into the cooling air ram. By utilizing this inventive array of heat exchangers, the present invention eliminates any need for a separate ram circuit.

FIG. 2 shows another embodiment 50 wherein the fan 52 is associated with its check valve 54 . The inlet 56 delivers air over a plurality of heat exchangers into a ram outlet 58 approaching the impeller for the fan 52 . There is a primary heat exchanger 60 for the cooling air being delivered to the compressor 30 and the secondary heat exchanger 62 as in FIG. 1 . A liquid heat exchanger 64 for cooling a refrigerant associated with the power electronics controllers is also placed within the ram circuit. Heat exchangers 66 and 68 are associated with power electronics 67 and 69 , respectively. Again, the present invention thus provides a cooling air ram that cools both air for various uses for an air conditioning system for an associated aircraft, and also provides a heat sink for cooling a cooling liquid, which is, in turn, utilized to cool control power electronics.

Although a preferred embodiment of this invention has been disclosed, a worker of ordinary skill in this art would recognize that certain modifications would come within the scope of this invention. For that reason, the following claims should be studied to determine the true scope and content of this invention.