Heat transfer in rod bundles cooled by supercritical water – Experimental data and correlations

Abstract

The paper presents the results of a comparative evaluation of existing correlations for the prediction of heat transfer to supercritical pressure water against experimental data for bundles of heated rods. It is shown that the method, developed by the authors for the engineering calculation of the heat transfer coefficient in the supercritical region of the coolant parameters, makes it possible to describe the experimental data for smooth rod bundles with an error of less than 15%. In the case of rod bundles with wrapped wire, the same method gives values of the heat transfer coefficient, which are on average about 8% lower compared to the experimental data obtained. This is connected with the intensification of heat transfer due to swirling the flow and can be considered as a margin when estimating the limiting temperature of the heat transfer wall. Based on the comparison of the calculation results by different methods, the problems of choosing the ratio for determining the heat transfer coefficient in fuel assemblies of reactors with supercritical pressure water are discussed.