Hydraulic Performance Of Heat Exchanger Research Articles

Experimental investigating the thermal and hydraulic performance of heat exchangers with helix wire finned tube

In this study, the helix wire finned tube is introduced as a novel design to increase the performance, reduce weight, and manufacturing price of the heat exchangers. The helix wire fin can make turbulence in the fin-side flow, creates a larger contact surface, more flow trapping and increment in the residence time for enhancement of the heat transfer. The effect of Reynolds number inside and outside of the finned tube and inter-tube distance on the thermo-hydraulic performance of the heat exchanger has been investigated experimentally. The results show that increasing the Reynolds outside the finned tube causes an 80% enhancement in the performance evaluation criterion of the heat exchanger. Also, helix wire finned tubes provide a maximum of 65% and 57% better thermal performance compared to spiral and serrated fins. Increasing the Reynolds number of the outside and inside tube flow causes a 40% and 50% enhancement in the Nusselt number of the fin-side flow, respectively. Moreover, increasing the longitudinal distance between the tube rows reduces the Nusselt number and friction factor of the fin-side flow by 20% and 45%, respectively. Finally, an experimental correlation is derived to calculate the Nusselt number of the air-side flow.

Thermal–hydraulic efficiency management of spiral heat exchanger filled with Cu–ZnO/water hybrid nanofluid

In this paper, the effect of different channel spacing in spiral heat exchanger filled with Cu–ZnO–water hybrid nanofluid was investigated to find the optimum thermal–hydraulic performance. The hot water flow enters into the test section from central aperture of heat exchanger, and the cold hybrid nanofluid flow enters into the test section from the outer aperture of the heat exchanger. The effects of different flow velocities, nanoparticles φ and channel spacing values have been analyzed. Results have been presented on Nusselt number, outlet temperature, pressure drop and PEC. According to the obtained results, channel spacing decrease in constant flow velocity values is more effective than volume fraction increase on outlet temperature improvement. Also, an increase in inlet flow velocity leads to lower heat transfer between cold and hot channels, but the growth of volume fraction can improve the thermal efficiency of the heat exchanger at high velocities. On the other hand, the reduction in channel spacing leads to more pressure drop penalty. Especially for the hot water flow, this behavior reduces the hydraulic performance of heat exchanger. The less the channel spacing, the more the pressure drop. The highest average Nusselt number occurs at a velocity of 0.45 (m s−1) and φ = 4% at a channel spacing of 35 mm. The maximum value of the pressure drop occurs at b = 2.5–5 mm. Besides considering the PEC value, 2% volume fraction is recommended for the spiral heat exchanger.

Thermal and hydraulic performance of SCO2 PCHE with different fin configurations

The numerical study of thermal and hydraulic performance of a supercritical CO2 (SCO2) printed circuit heat exchanger (PCHE) has been conducted and validated using published experimental data. A domain optimization study has been carried out to finalize a PCHE domain with significantly reduced computational time without compromising the accuracy of the solution. The optimized domain was used to evaluate the thermal and hydraulic performance of the heat exchanger with a wide range of Reynolds numbers and different geometrical configurations. In contrast to subcritical region, thermophysical properties of CO2 undergo sharp variations close to the critical point. In order to capture the swift variation in thermophysical properties of CO2 and to ensure accurate prediction of thermal and hydraulic performance of heat exchanger, properties of SCO2 were computed using REFPROP. MATLAB was linked through a script to REFPROP and high-resolution real gas property (RGP) file was generated and supplied to a commercial code ANSYS-CFX for numerical simulations.

Computational investigation of heat transfer and pressure drop in a typical louver fin-and-tube heat exchanger for various louver angles and fin pitches

In this study 3-D numerical simulations on heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics for a typical louver fin-and- double-row tube heat exchanger were carried out. The heat transfer improvement and the corresponding pressure drop amounts were investigated depending on louver angles, fin pitch and Reynolds number, and reported in terms of Colburn j -factor and Fanning friction factor f . The heat transfer improvement and the corresponding pressure drop amounts were investigated depending on louver angles between 20° ≤Ө≤ 30°, louver pitch of Lp =3.8 mm and frontal velocities of U between 1.22 m/s - 3 m/s. In addition, flow visualization of detailed flow features results, such as velocity vectors, streamlines and temperature counters have been shown to understand heat transfer enhancement mechanism. The present results indicated that louver angle and fin pitch noticeably affected the thermal and hydraulic performance of heat exchanger. It has been seen that increasing louver angle, increases thermal performance while decreasing hydraulic performance associated to pressure drop for fin pitches of 3.2 mm and 2.5 mm. Fin pitch determines the flow behaviour that for fin pitch of 2 mm, increasing louver angle decreased heat transfer and pressure drop. Velocity vectors and streamlines give considerable information about the flow whether it is duct directed or louver directed. For all conditions the flow is louver directed.

Experimental investigation of thermal hydraulic performance of heat exchangers with different Reynolds numbers on both air-side and water-side

Steady state laminar flow and transition flow heat transfer performance of two types of wavy fin heat exchangers with different Reynolds numbers on both air and water sides was experimentally studied. The tubes and fins assembly was made of aluminum to eliminate any thermal contact resistance on the interface between the tubes and fins. A series of tests were conducted for air and water Reynolds number that ranged from 670 to 3432 and from 1952 to 5140 respectively. In order to reduce the testing time, Equipower heating method was adopted throughout the experiment. Results exhibited that transfer coefficient h increases sharply when the flow of water is transition, meanwhile the flow of air side is laminar or just reached the transition and the flow of the water side needed to be more intensive. But before the sudden changes of h, the h increases slowly with Rew increasing at the same Rea. When compared with the same Reynolds number on the air side, an improvement as high as 15% was observed for the h, but the pumping power was only increased by 5%. In addition, the thermal hydraulic performance of sharp corner wavy fin is better than that of the round corner wavy fin.

Study of junction flows in louvered fin round tube heat exchangers using the dye injection technique

Detailed studies of junction flows in heat exchangers with an interrupted fin design are rare. However, understanding these flow structures is important for design and optimization purposes, because the thermal hydraulic performance of heat exchangers is strongly related to the flow behaviour. In this study flow visualization experiments were performed in six scaled-up models of a louvered fin round tube heat exchanger. The models have three tube rows in a staggered layout and differ only in their fin spacing and louver angle. A water tunnel was designed and built and the flow visualizations were carried out using dye injection. At low Reynolds numbers the streakline follows the tube contours, while at higher Reynolds numbers a horseshoe vortex is developed ahead of the tubes. The two resulting streamwise vortex legs are destroyed by the downstream louvers (i.e. downstream the turnaround louver), especially at higher Reynolds numbers, smaller fin pitches and larger louver angles. Increasing the fin spacing results in a larger and stronger horseshoe vortex. This illustrates that a reduction of the fin spacing results in a dissipation of vortical motion by mechanical blockage and skin friction. Furthermore it was observed that the vortex strength and number of vortices in the second tube row is larger than in the first tube row. This is due to the thicker boundary layer in the second tube row, and the flow deflection, which is typical for louvered fin heat exchangers. Visualizations at the tube-louver junction showed that in the transition part between the angled louver and the flat landing a vortex is present underneath the louver surface which propagates towards the angled louver.

Impact of deposit ageing on thermal fouling: Lumped parameter model

AbstractThe thermal and hydraulic performance of heat exchangers can be seriously impaired by the formation of fouling deposits on the heat transfer surfaces. The thermal effect of fouling can be complicated when the deposit is subject to ageing, represented here as a change in deposit thermal conductivity (but not thickness) over time. In this article, we revisit the ageing concept for crude oil fouling proposed by Nelson (Refiner Nat Gas Manufacturer. 1934;13:271–276, 292–298), using a numerical model incorporating first order kinetics to generate quantitative comparisons of different ageing rates. Results are reported for lumped parameter systems (which also simulate point measurement methods commonly used in laboratory testing) that demonstrate that ageing can have a substantial influence on the rate of heat transfer and hence on the surface temperature and rate of fouling. Rapid ageing (compared with the rate of deposition) does not pose problems, but slow ageing, or the use of constant heat fluxes in experiments, can lead to modified thermal fouling behavior. It is concluded that deposit ageing dynamics should be considered alongside deposition rate dynamics when interpreting experimental fouling data and when modeling fouling behavior in support of heat exchanger design or operation. © 2009 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2010

Ground-water levels in pennsylvania make notable recovery from extreme low stages

Detailed studies of junction flows in heat exchangers with an interrupted fin design are rare. However, understanding these flow structures is important for design and optimization purposes, because the thermal hydraulic performance of heat exchangers is strongly related to the flow behaviour. In this study flow visualization experiments were performed in six scaled-up models of a louvered fin round tube heat exchanger. The models have three tube rows in a staggered layout and differ only in their fin spacing and louver angle. A water tunnel was designed and built and the flow visualizations were carried out using dye injection. At low Reynolds numbers the streakline follows the tube contours, while at higher Reynolds numbers a horseshoe vortex is developed ahead of the tubes. The two resulting streamwise vortex legs are destroyed by the downstream louvers (i.e. downstream the turnaround louver), especially at higher Reynolds numbers, smaller fin pitches and larger louver angles. Increasing the fin spacing results in a larger and stronger horseshoe vortex. This illustrates that a reduction of the fin spacing results in a dissipation of vortical motion by mechanical blockage and skin friction. Furthermore it was observed that the vortex strength and number of vortices in the second tube row is larger than in the first tube row. This is due to the thicker boundary layer in the second tube row, and the flow deflection, which is typical for louvered fin heat exchangers. Visualizations at the tube-louver junction showed that in the transition part between the angled louver and the flat landing a vortex is present underneath the louver surface which propagates towards the angled louver.