Turbulent heat transfer in a liquid metal tube flow with azimuthally inhomogeneous heat flux

Abstract

An experimental study of the convective heat transfer in a turbulent liquid metal tube flow with azimuthally inhomogeneous heat flux is presented. Prior to the liquid metal experiments, the validation of the test section was realized using water. These results showed a very good agreement with literature data. For the liquid metal experiments, an eutectic alloy of gallium, indium and tin (GaInSn) was used. The Péclet number was varied between 1400 and 3600, thus in a regime of forced convection. Experiments with homogeneous heating over the full circumference of the tube and inhomogeneous heating over half of the circumference with the other half being insulated, were performed. The azimuthally averaged Nusselt number and the temperature distribution in the tube wall were investigated. The results suggest that the azimuthally averaged Nusselt number for water and liquid metal tube flows with inhomogeneous heating over the circumference can be calculated sufficiently well with literature correlations for uniform heat flux. For an inhomogeneous heat flux the azimuthal temperature gradient in the tube wall increases for higher Reynolds number and is more pronounced for GaInSn than for water. Furthermore, impurities like oxide particles significantly decrease the liquid metal convective heat transfer coefficient.