Experimental investigation of Marangoni condensation of ethanol–water mixture vapors on vertical tube

Abstract

The heat transfer characteristics of the condensation of ethanol–water binary vapor on vertical tubes with the pipe diameter of 10 mm were investigated experimentally. The results showed that, with the change of the vapor-to-surface temperature difference, the condensation heat transfer coefficients revealed nonlinear characteristics with peak values under a wide variety of operating conditions. With the increasing pressure or velocity of the vapor, the heat transfer coefficients increased subsequently. The effect of vapor pressure or velocity on heat transfer coefficients reduced with the increasing ethanol mass fraction. It was noteworthy that, under low ethanol mass fractions (0.5–2%), the heat transfer coefficients augmented significantly, were about 5–8 times greater than that of pure steam. The comparison for different test blocks indicated that the condensation heat transfer coefficients for different pipe diameters were about the same value under the same operating condition. Significant heat transfer enhancement by Marangoni condensation could be achieved for full range of pipe diameter used in industrial condensers.