Design and Test Results of Multi-Evaporator Loop Heat Pipes

Loop Heat Pipe (LHP) technology has advanced to the point that LHPs are baselined for thermal control systems in many spacecraft applications. These applications typically utilize a loop heat pipe with a single evaporator. However, many emerging applications involve heat sources with large thermal footprints, or multiple heat sources that would be better served by LHPs with multiple evaporators. Other investigators have proposed systems containing several evaporators that are coupled to a common reservoir; however, this approach places severe restrictions on the relative locations of the evaporators. This paper describes a multiple evaporator loop heat pipe, with a separate reservoir for each evaporator, which can accommodate payloads with large or spatially separated heat sources.