Experimental and numerical investigations for effect of longitudinal splitter plate configuration for thermal-hydraulic performance of staggered tube bank

Abstract

The use of fins for the passive mode of heat transfer enhancement is being used since decades. The use of fin increases the rate of heat transfer by increasing the effective area available for the energy exchange. Hence, most of the modern heat exchanger makes use of different types of the fins to make the device more efficient and compact. Most of the fin configuration used in the heat exchanger not only increases the rate of heat transfer but also causes an undesirable rise in pumping power owing to the additional air/fluid resistance encountered. In the present study, longitudinal fins in the form of a splitter plates are used for the experimental study in case of a staggered cross flow tube bank. The splitter plate geometric configuration such as splitter plate length (0.50 ≤ L/D ≤ 1.50) and plate thickness (0.04 ≤ t/D ≤ 0.20) are varied to further enhance the overall thermal hydraulic performance of the tube bank. The three-dimensional numerical study is also performed for better fluid flow visualization. The use of the splitter plate with L/D = 1.0 and t/D = 0.20 improves the Nusselt number with the reduction in the overall pressure drop for most of the configuration, resulting in an improvement in the thermal-hydraulic performance of tube bank. Moreover, statistical correlations are developed for the Nusselt number and friction factor characteristics for longitudinally finned tube bank for the entire range of Reynolds number from 5000 to 25000.