Aircraft air chiller with reduced profile

Abstract

An improved aircraft air chiller unit particularly suited for an aircraft galley that requires refrigerated or cooled beverage/meal carts and/or chilled storage compartments. The chiller of the present invention takes the form of a line replaceable unit (“LRU”) and incorporates a liquid-cooled refrigerant vapor compression cycle, arranged in a housing with a vertical orientation. Because of the vertical orientation, ducting on the rear surface of the chiller is omitted, reducing the overall footprint.

We claim: 
     
         1 . A liquid-cooled, vertically oriented, line replaceable unit (LRU) chiller for cooling adjacent aircraft galley carts having a reduced footprint through omission of ducting along a peripheral surface, comprising:
 a housing having at least one fan along an upper surface for drawing in air to the chiller unit through the upper surface and an opening in a bottom surface for expelling chilled air through the bottom of the housing;   a pair of quick disconnect couplings for connecting with a condenser and an aircraft heat sink;   an evaporator disposed directly below the at least one fan;   a compressor;   a heat exchanger;   a liquid cooled condenser;   an evaporator; and   wherein warm air enters through an upper surface of the housing and chilled air is expelled through a bottom opening in the housing.   
     
     
         2 . The liquid-cooled, vertically oriented, line replaceable unit chiller of  claim 1 , wherein a profile of the housing is a trapezoid. 
     
     
         3 . The liquid-cooled, vertically oriented, line replaceable unit chiller of  claim 1 , wherein polyethylene glycol water is circulated through the heat exchanger. 
     
     
         4 . The liquid-cooled, vertically oriented, line replaceable unit chiller of  claim 3 , further comprising a liquid pump to pump the polyethylene glycol water from a collection container to the heat exchanger. 
     
     
         5 . The liquid-cooled, vertically oriented, line replaceable unit chiller of  claim 1 , wherein the at least one fan is a plurality of axial fans.