Abstract: A series of vortex tube nozzles were designed and fabricated,and the effect of various cross sections of nozzle and the number of the nozzle intakes on the energy separation performance of a vortex tube were investigated experimentally by using air as test fluid. The experimental results showed that the vortex tube with the nozzle cross section designed in this study was superior to that with the nozzles of normal rectangle cross section and that of Archimedes’ spiral type in terms of regeneration temperature performance under the condition of ambient temperature with inlet pressure of 0.4 MPa.The cooling performance of the vortex tube with four intakes nozzle was the best while that of the vortex tube with eight intakes nozzle was the worst under the same experimental condition.