Environmentally Driven Development of New Heat Exchanger Materials

Due to coming more stringent legislation regarding emission of diesel engines, material considerations in heat exchangers will be a topic. This paper describes a method to compare the durability of tube to header joints in brazed, welded or soldered execution at ambient and elevated temperatures. Instead of pressure cycle test a complete heat exchanger only one tube to header joint is tested at a time.. This method could initially be used for selection of materials and joining methods with respect to durability. Calculations are presented to show the analogy between the described test method and internal pressure pulsation. Examples of measured results are presented. By combining different tube and braze filler materials comparing studies can be done.