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Stirling engine
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=== Pressurization === In most high-power Stirling engines, both the minimum pressure and mean pressure of the working fluid are above atmospheric pressure. This initial engine pressurization can be realized by a pump, or by filling the engine from a compressed gas tank, or even just by sealing the engine when the mean temperature is lower than the mean [[operating temperature]]. All of these methods increase the mass of working fluid in the thermodynamic cycle. All of the heat exchangers must be sized appropriately to supply the necessary heat transfer rates. If the heat exchangers are well designed and can supply the heat [[flux]] needed for convective [[heat transfer]], then the engine, in a first approximation, produces power in proportion to the mean pressure, as predicted by the [[West number]] and [[Beale number]]. In practice, the maximum pressure is also limited to the safe pressure of the [[pressure vessel]]. Like most aspects of Stirling engine design, optimization is [[multivariable calculus|multivariate]], and often has conflicting requirements.<ref name="Organ-1997" /> A difficulty of pressurization is that while it improves the power, the heat required increases proportionately to the increased power. This heat transfer is made increasingly difficult with pressurization since increased pressure also demands increased thicknesses of the walls of the engine, which, in turn, increase the resistance to heat transfer.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}}
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