Effect of Pin Fins on Jet Impingement Heat Transfer on A Rotating Disk

Abstract

Abstract Heat transfer on rotating surfaces is a predominant phenomenon in rotating machinery as in the case of the gas turbine disk. The gas turbine disk needs to be cooled as well as protected from the ingress of hot turbine gases in the stator-rotor cavity. In the current study, an experimental investigation of the heat transfer of an impinging air jet on a surface rotating at low rotational Reynolds number has been carried out. Addition of pin-fins on the disk surface is an effective way to enhance the heat transfer between the disk and the jet of cooling air. The effect of addition of an inline array of square pin fins on the rotating disk heat transfer has been investigated in this study. Steady state measurements have been carried out using thermocouples embedded at different locations in an aluminum disk with an array of square pin-fins rotating in a large space. Experiments have been conducted at rotational Reynolds numbers (ReR) of 5,487–12,803 based on the disk diameter (D) and jet Reynolds numbers (Re) of 5,000–18,000 based on the jet diameter (d). Two different ratios of jet to nozzle spacing and jet diameter (z/d) of 2 and 4 and three different impingement locations – at eccentricities (ε) – 0, 0.33 and 0.67 have been considered. The diameter of the impinging jet has been kept constant in order to maintain an equal jet footprint across all the cases. The area averaged Nusselt number over the surface with pin fins has been compared with a smooth rotating disk of equal diameter. Results indicate that for the smooth surface, ε and ReR have negligible effect on Nu. However, addition of pin fins enhance Nu by a factor between 1.5 and 3.9 in the present study. Qualitative visualization of flow field has been performed using the commercial simulation package Ansys Fluent to further understand the heat transfer trends.