Revisiting thermo-physical property models of Al2O3-Water nanofluid for natural convective flow

Abstract

One of the comprehensive ways of heat transport performance augmentation of thermo-fluid systems is to use nanofluid over base fluid. This study mainly scrutinizes several existing models of thermal conduction coefficient and absolute viscosity of Al2O3-water nanofluid with the experimental data. A benchmark problem of natural convective flow is selected to test the performance of the available nanofluid models. The Rayleigh number varies between 103 and 109, while the solid-volume proportion (φ) changes from 0 to 4%. The governing mathematical model is numerically discretized via the Galerkin finite element procedure under appropriate auxiliary conditions. The results produced by the models are verified with the existing experimental findings based on the evaluation of the Prandtl number and average Nusselt number. It has been confirmed that the AH model (Azmi's viscosity and Ho's conductivity models) is suitable for lower nanoparticle concentration (φ = 0.01), the AM model (Azmi's viscosity and Maxwell's conductivity models) for moderate concentration (0.01 < φ < 0.04), and the NH model (Ngueyn's viscosity and Ho's conductivity models) for higher value of the solid-volume proportion (φ = 0.04).