Question

What is unique about an azeotropic refrigerant mixture?

Answer 1

Hint :We can say that Refrigerant mixtures are mixtures of two (binary) or more pure fluids that boil at the same time. The components in refrigerant azeotropes will evaporate and condense together as one. There is no temperature glide to worry about with these types of mixture. In chemistry an azeotropic mixture is a mixture of substances that has the same concentration in vapour and fluid phases.

Complete Step By Step Answer:
The azeotropic mixtures are usually binary mixtures meaning they have two or more components. They behave like a pure fluid, i.e., under constant pressure they condense and evaporate at a constant temperature and the composition of the mixture in the vapour and liquid phases will be the same. This is very advantageous in case of refrigeration because any refrigerant leak from the system does not change the composition of the remaining refrigerant.
Azeotropic mixtures have been very widely used in refrigeration because they can be used as refrigeration mixtures, for example the popular cold storage refrigerant R502 is a mixture of R22 and R152a.
A refrigerant may be either a pure compound or a mixture (blend) of two or more refrigerants.

Note :
The difference between azeotropic and zeotropic is that azeotrope is a mixture of substances that has the same concentration in both vapour and fluid phases while zoetrope is a mixture of liquids that may be separated via the gas phase by using processes like distillation. A zeotropic mixture is also called a non-azeotropic mixture, is a mixture with components that have different boiling points.