Experimental Study of Natural Convection Enhancement Using a Fe3O4-Water Based Magnetic Nanofluid

Abstract

The effect of nanoparticles dispersed in a carrier fluid on the natural convection heat transfer is still raising controversies. While the reported experimental results show no improvement or even worsening of the heat transfer performance of nanofluids, the numerical simulations show an increase of the heat transfer coefficient, at least for certain ranges of Ra number. We report an experimental investigation regarding the natural convection heat transfer performance of a Fe3O4-water based nanofluid, in a cylindrical enclosure. The fluid was heated linearly from the bottom wall using an electric heater and cooled from the upper wall by a constant flow of water, such that a constant temperature difference between the upper and bottom walls was obtained at steady-state. The experiment was also carried out using water, in order to observe the effect of the addition of Fe3O4 nanoparticles on the heat transfer coefficient. Several regimes were tested, both for water and nanofluid. The experimental results showed that values obtained for the heat transfer coefficient for Fe3O4-water nanofluid were higher than those for water, at the same temperature difference. The present experimental results are also compared with our previous work and the reference literature.