Experimental study and general correlation for frictional pressure drop of two-phase flow inside microfin tubes

Abstract

The adiabatic pressure drop in a microfin tube with an outside diameter of 3.5 mm was experimentally studied herein. The experiments were conducted using R1234yf as a working fluid at saturation temperatures of 20 °C and 30 °C with varying mass velocities from 50 to 300 kg m−2s−1 and vapor qualities ranging from 0.1 to 0.9. The effects of experimental conditions were analyzed and discussed with present and previous data. A new two-phase flow frictional pressure drop correlation has been developed using the data with tube diameter of 2.5–9.52 mm, mass velocity of 50–1000 kg m−2s−1, and many kinds of refrigerants. The proposed correlation predicts the experimental data of other researchers with mean deviation of 17.6%.