Experimental Study on Heat Transfer Enhancement of Modified CuO Nanofluid in Helical Grooved Tube

Abstract

This study proposes a novel technology to enhance heat transfer by combining nanofluid and helical grooved tubes. The researchers used a two-step method to obtain a stable modified CuO nanofluid. They then constructed an experimental setup to investigate the single-phase heat transfer of the nanofluid in a helical grooved tube, and compared its performance to traditional methods under varying volume fractions and Reynolds numbers. The experimental results indicate that the use of nanofluid in the helical grooved tube significantly improves the convective heat transfer coefficient. Furthermore, the heat transfer coefficient increases gradually with the addition of nanoparticle volume fraction and Reynolds number. The helical grooved tube’s internal structure causes local turbulence at low Reynolds numbers, intensifying the nano-scale eddies and turbulence inside the nanofluid, enhancing fluid mixing and thermal diffusion rates, and thus improving the heat transfer efficiency.