Li-Ion batteries are currently used in hybrid and electric vehicles. Battery life and performance requires temperature control in narrow range. One of the methods considered is use of specially designed heat pipe. The study includes a heat pipe between two battery simulators. The heat pipe was cooled by air flow of 2.5 m/s and with temperature range of from 9°C to 40°C.

We have compared the measured surface temperature distributions to those which were received from computer simulation in order to obtain effective thermal conductivity of the heat pipe and its thermal performance. This effective thermal conductivity increases, as the inlet air temperature increases and reaches the value of 2500 W/(m×K).