On the corrugation effect on thermo-fluids characteristics and entropy generation in channels equipped with wavy and straight sections

Abstract

A numerical simulation was performed to investigate the characteristics of thermo-fluids and the irreversibility generation of laminar forced convection through three different channel designs. This article first presents a comprehensive study of combination of straight and wavy sections in order to create a balance between improved thermal performance from the wavy design and optimized flow properties from the straight section, leading to an overall enhancement in cooling efficiency. A novel design has been considered using a channel configuration that consists of different lengths of wavy and straight sections and is named (cases I, II, and III). The outcomes are shown in terms of average Nu, enhancement ratio (ER), performance factor, total irreversibility generation, as well as the contours of streamlines, isothermal, and Bejan numbers for different values of the Reynolds number range of 5≤Re≤400 and dimensionless wave amplitude 0.3≤α≤0.6. The results were compared of the three cases with the plane channel, revealing an augmentation in HTR of 73.7%, 64.9%, and 43.3% for cases III, II, and I, respectively. On the other hand, with both Re and α, the total irreversibility generation increases continuously.