Experimental determination of natural convection heat transfer coefficients in an attic shaped enclosure

Abstract

Heat transfer by natural convection in triangular enclosures is an area of significant importance in applications such as the design of greenhouses, attics and solar water heaters. However, given its significance to these areas it has not been widely examined. In this study, the natural convection heat transfer coefficients for air in an attic shaped enclosure were determined for Grashof Numbers over the range of 10 7 to 10 9. It was found that the measured heat transfer coefficients could be predicted to within 5% by Ridouane and Campo's [E.H. Ridouane, A. Campo, Experimental-based correlations for the characterization of free convection of air inside isosceles triangular cavities with variable apex angles, Experimental Heat Transfer 18 (2) (2005) 81–86] equation (Eq. (1)) for natural convection in a triangular enclosure previously developed for Grashof Numbers in the range of 10 5 to 10 6. (1) N u = 0.286 A − 0.286 G r 1 / 4 . As such, it is suggested that this equation may be suitable for predicting the natural convection heat transfer coefficients in full scale attic enclosures.