Thermal performance of ternary-hybrid nanofluids through a convergent-divergent nozzle using distilled water - ethylene glycol mixtures

Abstract

A computational analysis is conducted based on ternary-nanoparticles performance for base fluid mixture through a convergent-divergent (CD) nozzle. Since the thermal phenomena through a CD nozzle exposes many attention-grabbing performances, it deserves additional investigation for laminar flow characteristics. Using ternary-nanoparticles at different base fluid mixture makes the study more robust and interesting to analyze the real situation better. In this study, the properties of cobalt (Co), silver (Ag), and zinc (Zn) nanoparticles along with base fluid mixtures of distilled-water (DW) and ethylene glycol (EG) as (100:0), (60:40), (50:50), and (0:100), are employed. A wide range of inlet velocity, solid concentrations, nanoparticle size and magnitude of nanoparticle shape factor is considered in this research. The mixtures of nanoparticles are considered as a ratio of (0:1/2:1/2), (1/2:0:1/2), (1/2:1/2:0), (1/6:1/6:2/3), (1/6:2/3:1/6), (2/3:1/6:1/6) and (1/3:1/3:1/3). The mathematical model is formulated using Navier-Stokes equations, energy conservation with proper boundary conditions, and solved using finite element method. Among the considered base fluid mixtures, the highest heat transfer rate is obtained for EG-Co-Ag-Zn nanofluid. A relatively higher heat transfer rate is found for all base fluid mixtures with nanoparticles ratio (1/6:2/3:1/6) compared to other combinations. Furthermore, advanced rate of thermal transport is found using laminar shape nanoparticles.