抄録
This paper describes powder metallurgical fabrication of an FGM compliant pad which is used as electrode as well as conductible coupling between thermoelectric (TE) module and heating or cooling duct. The compliant pad is designed to allow high heat flux with direct conduction path to heat source and heat sink, resulting in the increase of the efficiency of thermoelectric energy conversion. In addition, it offers the structural flexibility to protect the TE module from high thermal stress due to the mismatch of thermal expansion coefficient, electrical insulation between the electrode and the duct and in-plane electrical conductivity by the use of symmetric FGM structure. Nickel and alumina powders are used for raw materials. The optimization of compositional gradient for symmetric FGM has been performed by using thermal stress and thermal conduction analysis. Nickel/alumina symmetric FGMs have been successfully fabricated by spark plasma sintering process under the suited condition for the densification of nickel and alumina powder compacts.
