Buoyancy enhanced natural convection inside the ventilated square enclosure with a partition and an overhanging transverse baffle

Abstract

Finite difference based numerical studies of steady laminar natural convection inside the open square enclosure with protrusions are presented. The fluid considered is air with a Prandtl number of 0.71. The buoyancy enabled cold air flows from bottom-left vertical wall to the diagonally opposite top-right vertical wall crossing the obstacles in the form of a partition and transverse baffles. All the external peripheral walls are considered as hot and the interior cross walls are assumed as cold. The effect of obstacles on the heat transfer is numerically investigated. The convective heat transfer mechanism is enhanced further through the Rayleigh number by varying Ra as 103, 104 and 105. The subtle variation in buoyancy, momentum, hydrodynamic blockage and protrusions influences the formation, size and geometry of the vortices and also influences the heat transfer intensities inside the enclosure. The intriguing physics is elucidated with streamlines, isotherms, Local Nusselt number and velocity profiles. The study reveals that the introduction of cold baffle intensifies the heat transfer inside the enclosure irrespective of its position and length. The hydrodynamic blockage effect is dominant when the transverse baffle is positioned on the right side of the partition.