TD Deutsche Klimakompressor GmbH (TDDK) manufactures compressors for air conditionings. They are used within the coolant circuits of car air conditionings.
Our compressors were the first ones with a swash plate allowing variable volume and cooling capacity according to the needs in an actual situation.
The compressor as the centerpiece of the cooling system
Operating principle: The compressor sucks in the cold, gaseous coolant coming with low pressure from the evaporator. The compressor compresses the gas which then goes on to the condensator as a hot gas with high pressure.
Compressors in car air conditionings are displacement compressors operating at a high speed, i. e. up to 9000 rotations per minute or 150 rotations per second. A special refrigerator oil is used for lubrication. Approximately 50 % of it stays in the compressor, while the rest is circulating through the air conditioning system together with the coolant.
The main types of compressors are axial piston compressors, spiral compressors and vane type compressors. Axial piston compressors are the most common ones in today’s car air conditionings, but in small cars also scroll type compressors are used.
TDDK only produces axial piston compressors, namely swash plate compressors. Driving disk and swash plate convert the movement of the drive shaft into the axial movement of the pistons. Depending on the necessary cooling capacity compressors with five, six or seven pistons are produced.
Until the 1990ies, compressors used to have a fixed plate with a fixed volume. Adjustment to changing cooling capacity was only possible by periodically turning the compressor on and off via the magnetic clutch. This resulted in a jerk that was noticable during driving.
In the 1990ies, Toyota Industries Corporation developped the first compressor with a moveable swash plate allowing variable compression volume and thus steplessy variable cooling capacity without jerky on and offs.
When the swash plate is at full inclination, the compressor operates with full capacity. When cooling requirements are low, the inclination angle of the swash plate is low and the stroke of the piston becomes short.