Heat exchanger

Heat exchanger

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• Base game
 
• Space Age mod

Recipe
3 + 100 + 10 + 10 → 1
Total raw
8 + 100 + 10 + 10
Map color
Fluid storage volume	Input: 200 Output: 200
Health	200 260 320 380 500
Resistances	Explosion: 0/30% Fire: 0/90% Impact: 0/30%
Stack size	50
Rocket capacity	25 (0.5 stacks)
Dimensions	2×3
Energy consumption	10 13 16 19 25 MW (heat)
Heat output	103/s 134/s 165/s 196/s 258/s steam
Maximum temperature	1000 °C
Fluid consumption	10.3/s 13.4/s 16.5/s 19.6/s 25.8/s water
Mining time	0.1
Prototype type	boiler
Internal name	heat-exchanger
Required technologies
Produced by

Recipe
3 + 100 + 10 + 10 → 1
Total raw
8 + 100 + 10 + 10
Map color
Fluid storage volume	Input: 200 Output: 200
Health	200 260 320 380 500
Resistances	Explosion: 0/30% Fire: 0/90% Impact: 0/30%
Stack size	50
Rocket capacity	25 (0.5 stacks)
Dimensions	2×3
Energy consumption	10 13 16 19 25 MW (heat)
Heat output	103/s 134/s 165/s 196/s 258/s steam
Maximum temperature	1000 °C
Fluid consumption	10.3/s 13.4/s 16.5/s 19.6/s 25.8/s water
Mining time	0.1
Prototype type	boiler
Internal name	heat-exchanger
Required technologies
Produced by

The heat exchanger exchanges heat between a heat connection (normally from a heat pipe leading to a nuclear reactor or heating tower) and water to produce steam.

Heat exchangers produce ~103 steam with a temperature of 500°C every second.

Heat exchangers will not produce steam until they reach 500°C. The steam produced is exactly 500°C hot, even if the exchanger is hotter. Heat exchangers have a heat capacity of 1 MJ/°C. Thus, they can buffer 500 MJ of heat energy across their working range of 500°C to 1000°C, and require 485 MJ of energy to warm up from 15°C to 500°C when initially placed.

Calculating steam production rate

Heat exchangers produce 103 steam/second. This can be calculated by relying on steam turbine data: A steam turbine consumes 60 steam/second and produces 5.82MW (assuming 500°C steam). This means a single unit of 500°C steam has 5.82MW / (60/s) = 0.097 MJ of energy. A heat exchanger produces 10 MJ a second, therefore it produces 10MJ / 0.097MJ = 103.0927835 steam per second.

The steam production rate can also be calculated using the energy consumption: 1 heat exchanger consumes 10MW, so it's putting 10MJ of energy into heating water/steam per second. To heat up 1 unit of water 1 degree, 200 joules are needed, so the heat exchanger is heating up water by 50,000 unit-°C in total. We observe that this heating results in a temperature increase from 15°C to 500°C, so an increase of 485°C. So the 50,000 unit-°C is divided among 103 units of steam per second, since 50,000 / 485 = 103.09. Since steam is produced from water in a 10:1 ratio, this also means that 10.3 units of water are consumed per second.

History

• 2.0.7:
  • 1 Water will now produce 10 Steam in boilers/heat exchangers.

• 0.17.67:
  • Heat pipes (also in reactors and heat exchangers) glow with high temperatures.

• 0.15.0:
  • Introduced
  • Doubled the heat capacity of water from 0.1kJ per degree per liter to 0.2kJ

See also

• Nuclear power
• Steam turbine
• Nuclear reactor
• Heat pipe