Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Natural Convection Heat Transfer From Horizontal Rectangular Plate Fin Pin Fin Arrays

Author(s):  
Sunil V. Dingare ◽  
Narayan K. Sane ◽  
Ratnakar R. Kulkarni

Abstract Fins are commonly employed for cooling of electronic equipment, compressors, Internal Combustion engines and for heat exchange in various heat exchangers. In short fin (length to height ratio, L/H = 5) arrays used for natural convection cooling, a stagnation zone forms at the central portion and that portion is not effective for carrying away heat. An attempt is made to modify plate fin heat sink geometry (PFHS) by inserting pin fins in the channels formed between plate fins and a plate fin pin fin heat sink (PFPFHS) is constructed to address this issue. An experimental setup is developed to validate numerical model of PFPFHS. The three-dimensional elliptic governing equations were solved using a finite volume based computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code. Fluent 6.3.26, a finite volume flow solver is used for solving the set of governing equations for the present geometry. Cell count based on grid independence and extended domain is used to obtain numerical results. Initially, the numerical model is validated for PFHS cases reported in the literature. After obtaining a good agreement with results from the literature, the numerical model for PFHS is modified for PFPFHS and used to carry out systematic parametric study of PFPFHS to analyze the effects of parameters like fin spacing, fin height, pin fin diameter, number of pin fins and temperature difference between fin array and surroundings on natural convection heat transfer from PFPFHS. It is observed that it is impossible to obtain optimum performance in terms of overall heat transfer by only concentrating on one or two parameters. The interactions among all the design parameters must be considered. This thesis presents Experimental and Numerical study of natural convection heat transfer from horizontal rectangular plate fin and plate fin pin fin arrays. The parameters of study are fin spacing, temperature difference between the fin surface and ambient air, fin height, pin fin diameter, number of pin fins and method of positioning pin fins in the fin channel. Experimental set up is validated with horizontal plate standard correlations. Results are generated in the form of variation in average heat transfer coefficient (ha), base heat transfer coefficient (hb), average Nusselt number (Nua) and base Nusselt number (Nub). Total 512 cases are studied numerically and finally an attempt is made to correlate the Nusselt Number (Nu), Rayleigh Number (Ra), increase in percentage by inserting pin fins (% Area), ratios like spacing to height (S/H) and L/H obtained in the present study.

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (6 Part A) ◽  
pp. 2493-2502
Author(s):  
Saurav Manna ◽  
Subhas Haldar ◽  
Subrata Ghosh

Heat transfer under laminar natural convection from a hollow cylindrical fin mounted on a horizontal base plate has been numerically studied. The flow outside the fin is much stronger than that inside the hole and as a consequence the rate of heat transfer from a hollow fin is primarily due to the contribution by the outer surface of the fin. Fortunately, the rate of heat transfer is not negatively affected by the presence of the hole at the fin centre. On the contrary, when the Grashof number is higher or the hole diameter is bigger, the inside surface contributes marginally to the heat transfer. A hollow fin saves material and weighs less compared to a solid fin. So, this feature may be exploited.


2021 ◽  
Vol 287 ◽  
pp. 03010
Author(s):  
Rajashekhar Pendyala ◽  
Suhaib Umer Ilyas ◽  
Yean Sang Wong

The heat transfer process takes place in numerous applications through the natural convection of fluids. Investigations of the natural convection heat transfer in enclosures have gained vital importance in the last decade for the improvement in thermal performance and design of the heating/cooling systems. Aspect ratios (AR=height/length) of the enclosures are one of the crucial factors during the natural convection heat transfer process. The investigated fluids consisting of air, water, engine oil, mercury, and glycerine have numerous engineering applications. Heat transfer and fluid flow characteristics are studied in 3-dimensional rectangular enclosures with varying aspect ratios (0.125 to 150) using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. Studies are carried out using the five different fluids having Prandtl number range 0.01 to 4500 in rectangular enclosures with the hot and cold surface with varying temperature difference 20K to 100K. The Nusselt number and heat transfer coefficients are estimated at all conditions to understand the dependency of ARs on the heat transfer performance of selected fluids. Temperature and velocity profiles are compared to study the flow pattern of different fluids during natural convection. The Nusselt number correlations are developed in terms of aspect ratio and Rayleigh number to signify the natural convection heat transfer performance.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sattar Aljobair ◽  
Akeel Abdullah Mohammed ◽  
Israa Alesbe

Abstract The natural convection heat transfer and fluid flow characteristic of water based Al2O3 nano-fluids in a symmetrical and unsymmetrical corrugated annulus enclosure has been studied numerically using CFD. The inner cylinder is heated isothermally while the outer cylinder is kept constant cold temperature. The study includes eight models of corrugated annulus enclosure with constant aspect ratio of 1.5. The governing equations of fluid motion and heat transfer are solved using stream-vorticity formulation in curvilinear coordinates. The range of solid volume fractions of nanoparticles extends from PHI=0 to 0.25, and Rayleigh number varies from 104 to 107. Streamlines, isotherms, local and average Nusselt number of inner and outer cylinder has been investigated in this study. Sixty-four correlations have been deduced for the average Nusselt number for the inner and outer cylinders as a function of Rayleigh number have been deduced for eight models and five values of volume fraction of nano particles with an accuracy range 6-12 %. The results show that, the average heat transfer rate increases significantly as particle volume fraction and Rayleigh number increase. Also, increase the number of undulations in unsymmetrical annuli reduces the heat transfer rates which remain higher than that in symmetrical annuli. There is no remarkable change in isotherms contour with increase of volume fraction of nanofluid.


2012 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 1317-1323 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ching-Chang Cho ◽  
Her-Terng Yau ◽  
Cha’o-Kuang Chen

This paper investigates the natural convection heat transfer enhancement of Al2O3-water nanofluid in a U-shaped cavity. In performing the analysis, the governing equations are modeled using the Boussinesq approximation and are solved numerically using the finite-volume numerical method. The study examines the effects of the nanoparticle volume fraction, the Rayleigh number and the geometry parameters on the mean Nusselt number. The results show that for all values of the Rayleigh number, the mean Nusselt number increases as the volume fraction of nanoparticles increases. In addition, it is shown that for a given length of the heated wall, extending the length of the cooled wall can improve the heat transfer performance.


Author(s):  
Golnoosh Mostafavi ◽  
Mehran Ahmadi ◽  
Majid Bahrami

Steady-state external natural convection heat transfer from vertically-mounted rectangular interrupted fins is investigated numerically and experimentally. To perform an experimental study, a custom-designed testbed was developed to verify the analytical and numerical results. FLUENT software was used in order to develop a 2-D numerical model for investigation of interruption effects. After regenerating, and validating the existing analytical results for fin spacing, a systematic numerical and experimental study was conducted on effect of fin interruption. Results show that adding interruptions to vertical rectangular fins enhances the thermal performance of fins. In a parametric study optimum interruption length for maximum fin performance was found and correlated.


Author(s):  
Jong K. Lee ◽  
Seung D. Lee ◽  
Kune Y. Suh

During a severe accident, the reactor core may melt and be relocated to the lower plenum to form a hemispherical pool. If there is no effective cooling mechanism, the core debris may heat up and the molten pool run into natural convection. Natural convection heat transfer was examined in SIGMA RP (Simulant Internal Gravitated Material Apparatus Rectangular Pool). The SIGMA RP apparatus comprises a rectangular test section, heat exchanger, cartridge heaters, cooling jackets, thermocouples and a data acquisition system. The internal heater heating method was used to simulate uniform heat source which is related to the modified Rayleigh number Ra′. The test procedure started with water, the working fluid, filling in the test section. There were two boundary conditions: one dealt with both walls being cooled isothermally, while the other had to with only the upper wall being cooled isothermally. The heat exchanger was utilized to maintain the isothermal boundary condition. Four side walls were surrounded by the insulating material to minimize heat loss. Tests were carried out at 1011 < Ra′ < 1013. The SIGMA RP tests with an appropriate cartridge heater arrangement showed excellent uniform heat generation in the pool. The steady state was defined such that the temperature fluctuation stayed within ±0.2 K over a time period of 5,000 s. The conductive heat transfer was dominant below the critical Rayleigh number Ra′c, whereas the convective heat transfer picked up above Ra′c. In the top and bottom boundary cooling condition, the upward Nusselt number Nuup was greater than the downward Nusselt number Nudn. In particular, the discrepancy between Nuup and Nudn widened with Ra′. The Nuup to Nudn ratio was varied from 7.75 to 16.77 given 1.45×1012 < Ra′ < 9.59×1013. On the other hand, Nuup was increased in absence of downward heat transfer for the case of top cooling. The current rectangular pool testing will be extended to include circular and spherical pools.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document