scholarly journals Numerical study of flow and heat transfer in differentially heated enclosures

2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 451-463 ◽  
Author(s):  
Byong-Hoon Chang

Two-dimensional laminar natural convection is studied numerically for differentially heated air-filled rectangular enclosures with adiabatic side walls and aspect ratios of 1, 2, 4 and 8. The inclination angle of the enclosure was varied from 0? to 180?, and the effect of inclination on flow field and heat transfer was investigated over the range 103 ? Ra ? 106. Correlations of average Nusselt number based on the present results are presented for horizontal and vertical cases. Large discrepancies were found among published results.

Author(s):  
Tarek M. Abdel-Salam

This study presents results for flow and heat transfer characteristics of two-dimensional rectangular impinging jets and three-dimensional circular impinging jets. Flow geometries under consideration are single and multiple impinging jets issued from a plane wall. Both confined and unconfined configurations are simulated. Effects of Reynolds number and the distance between the jets are investigated. Results are obtained with a finite volume computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code. Structured grids are used in all cases of the present study. Turbulence is treated with a two equation k-ε model. Different jet velocities have been examined corresponding to Reynolds numbers of 5,000 to 20,000. Results of the three-dimensional cases show that Reynolds number has no effect on the velocity distribution of the center jet. Results of both two-dimensional and three-dimensional cases show that Reynolds number highly affects the heat transfer and values of the Nusselt number. The maximum Nusselt number was always found at the stagnation point of the center jet.


Author(s):  
Salaika Parvin ◽  
Nepal Chandra Roy ◽  
Litan Kumar Saha ◽  
Sadia Siddiqa

A numerical study is performed to investigate nanofluids' flow field and heat transfer characteristics between the domain bounded by a square and a wavy cylinder. The left and right walls of the cavity are at constant low temperature while its other adjacent walls are insulated. The convective phenomena take place due to the higher temperature of the inner corrugated surface. Super elliptic functions are used to transform the governing equations of the classical rectangular enclosure into a system of equations valid for concentric cylinders. The resulting equations are solved iteratively with the implicit finite difference method. Parametric results are presented in terms of streamlines, isotherms, local and average Nusselt numbers for a wide range of scaled parameters such as nanoparticles concentration, Rayleigh number, and aspect ratio. Several correlations have been deduced at the inner and outer surface of the cylinders for the average Nusselt number, which gives a good agreement when compared against the numerical results. The strength of the streamlines increases significantly due to an increase in the aspect ratio of the inner cylinder and the Rayleigh number. As the concentration of nanoparticles increases, the average Nusselt number at the internal and external cylinders becomes stronger. In addition, the average Nusselt number for the entire Rayleigh number range gets enhanced when plotted against the volume fraction of the nanofluid.


Author(s):  
Liu Wenhua ◽  
Mo Yang ◽  
Li Ling ◽  
Qiao Liang ◽  
Yuwen Zhang

Turbulent flow and heat transfer in rectangular channel has an important significance in engineering. Conventional approach to caculate Nusselt number of rectangular channel approximately is to take the equivalent diameter as the characteristic length and use the classic circular channel turbulent heat transfer coefficient correlations. However, under these conditions, the caculation error of Nusselt number can reach to 14% and thus this approach can not substantially describe the variation of Nusselt number of rectangular cross-sections with different aspect ratios. Therefore, caculation by using equivalent diameter as the characteristic length in classic experiment formula needs to be corrected. Seven groups of rectangular channel models with different aspect ratios have been studied numerically in this paper. By using standard turbulence model, the flow and heat transfer law of air with varing properties has been studied in 4 different sets of conditions in Reynolds number. The simulation and experimental results are in good agreement. The simulation results show that with the increase of aspect ratio, the cross-sectional average Nusselt number increased, Nusselt number of circumferential wall distributed more evenly and the difference between the infinite plate channel and square channel went up to 25%. The effects of corner region and long\short sides on heat transfer have also been investigated in this paper. Results show that in rectangular channel, heat transfer in corner region is significantly weaker than it in other region. With the increase of aspect ratio, effect on the long side of heat transfer of the short side is gradually reduced, and then eventually eliminates completely in the infinite flat place. Based on the studies above, correction coefficient for rectangular channels with different aspect ratios has been proposed in this paper and the accuracy of the correction coefficient has been varified by numerical simulations. This can reflect the variation of Nusselt number under different aspect ratios more effectively and thus has current significance for project to calculate Nusselt number of heat transfer in rectangular channel.


1970 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sumon Saha ◽  
Noman Hasan ◽  
Chowdhury Md Feroz

A numerical study has been carried out for laminar natural convection heat transfer within a two-dimensional modified square enclosure having a triangular roof. The vertical sidewalls are differentially heated considering a constant flux heat source strip is flush mounted with the left wall. The opposite wall is considered isothermal having a temperature of the surrounding fluid. The rest of the walls are adiabatic. Air is considered as the fluid inside the enclosure. The solution has been carried out on the basis of finite element analysis by a non-linear parametric solver to examine the heat transfer and fluid flow characteristics. Different heights of the triangular roof have been considered for the present analysis. Fluid flow fields and isotherm patterns and the average Nusselt number are presented for the Rayleigh numbers ranging from 103 to 106 in order to show the effects of these governing parameters. The average Nusselt number computed for the case of isoflux heating is also compared with the case of isothermal heating as available in the literature. The outcome of the present investigation shows that the convective phenomenon is greatly influenced by the inclined roof height. Keywords: Natural convection, triangular roof, Rayleigh number, isoflux heating. Doi:10.3329/jme.v39i1.1826 Journal of Mechanical Engineering, vol. ME39, No. 1, June 2008 1-7


2000 ◽  
Vol 122 (3) ◽  
pp. 485-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. A. Holtzman ◽  
R. W. Hill ◽  
K. S. Ball

A numerical study of natural convection in an isosceles triangular enclosure with a heated horizontal base and cooled upper walls is presented. Nearly every previous study conducted on this subject to date has assumed that the geometric plane of symmetry is also a plane of symmetry for the flow. This problem is re-examined over aspect ratios ranging from 0.2 to 1.0 and Grashof numbers from 103 to 105. It is found that a pitchfork bifurcation occurs at a critical Grashof number for each of the aspect ratios considered, above which the symmetric solutions are unstable to finite perturbations and asymmetric solutions are instead obtained. Results are presented detailing the occurrence of the pitchfork bifurcation in each of the aspect ratios considered, and the resulting flow patterns are described. A flow visualization study is used to validate the numerical observations. Computed local and mean heat transfer coefficients are also presented and compared with results obtained when flow symmetry is assumed. Differences in local values of the Nusselt number between asymmetric and symmetric solutions are found to be more than 500 percent due to the shifting of the buoyancy-driven cells. [S0022-1481(00)02503-2]


1981 ◽  
Vol 103 (2) ◽  
pp. 226-231 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. S. Shiralkar ◽  
C. L. Tien

Heat transfer by natural convection in a horizontal cavity with adiabatic horizontal walls and isothermal side walls is investigated numerically for high aspect ratios (width/height). Comparison is made with existing analytical and experimental results. Agreement is generally good at moderate and high Prandtl numbers to which most previous works have been restricted. Improvements of the existing correlation have been proposed in regions of discrepancy. Extension to the low Prandtl number case, including the range of liquid metals, has been made on the basis of an analytical model for high Rayleigh numbers as well as by numerical solution of the full equations. The agreement between the two is found to be very good. A correlation for the heat transfer is proposed for each of the two different cases of high and low Prandtl number.


Author(s):  
M Ghazvini ◽  
M A Akhavan-Behabadi ◽  
M Esmaeili

The present article focuses on analytical and numerical study on the effect of viscous dissipation when nanofluid is used as the coolant in a microchannel heat sink (MCHS). The nanofluid is made from CuO nanoparticles and water. To analyse the MCHS, a modified Darcy equation for the fluid and two-equation model for heat transfer between fluid and solid sections are employed in porous media approach. In addition, to deal with nanofluid heat transfer, a model based on the Brownian motion of nanoparticles is used. The model evaluates the thermal conductivity of nanofluid considering the thermal boundary resistance, nanoparticle diameter, volume fraction, and the fluid temperature. At first, the effects of particle volume fraction on temperature distribution and overall heat transfer coefficient are investigated with and without considering viscous dissipation. After that, the influence of different channel aspect ratios and porosities is studied. The results show that for nanofluid flow in microchannels, the viscous dissipation can be neglected for low volume fractions and aspect ratios only. Finally, the effect of porosity and Brinkman number on the overall Nusselt number is studied, where asymptotic behaviour of the Nusselt number is observed and discussed from the energy balance point of view.


Author(s):  
Phaninder Injeti ◽  
Muhammad M. Rahman

Effects of obstructions on the heat transfer in a microtube and a two-dimensional microchannel were investigated. The obstructions normally arise during the fabrication process on the inner surface of the microtube or microchannel. Various shapes and sizes of the obstruction were considered. The shapes that were modeled were rectangular, triangular, and semicircular obstructions. Calculations were done for incompressible flow of a Newtonian fluid with developing momentum and thermal boundary layers. Equations governing the conservation of mass, momentum and energy were solved for an isothermal condition at the wall. Comparison with no obstruction case was made. It was found that for microtubes, the local Nusselt number increases significantly at the obstruction whereas the average Nusselt number for the whole tube comes out somewhat lower. For two-dimensional microchannels, both local Nusselt number at the obstruction as well as average Nusselt number for the entire tube came out to be higher. The working fluids that were investigated were water and refrigerant R-134a. The results presented in the paper demonstrates that in microchannels and microtubes that are widely used in micro electro mechanical systems (MEMS), small defects in the fabrication process may lead to large changes in local as well as global performance of the device.


Author(s):  
Lin Tian ◽  
Wei Bai ◽  
Shanhu Xue ◽  
Zipeng Huang ◽  
Qiuwang Wang

The unsteady turbulent flow and heat transfer in rectangular channel with periodic longitudinal vortex generators on up and bottom walls are investigated by standardized k-ε two equation turbulent model combined with standardized wall function which has been validated by steady experimental data. Influence of varying frequency and amplitude of inlet velocity varying by sine function on heat transfer and friction factor are discussed. It is found that parameters such as Tout, Tf, Tw, Nusselt number and the friction factor f vary with time periodically, phase difference occurred compared with inlet velocity. Pulsating frequency has little impact on time averaged Nusselt number. However, when amplitude increases from 0.2us to 0.8us, the heat transfer rate is augmented by about 4%. Furthermore, a critical frequency has been captured when amplitude equals to 0.8us for the channel studied. The current study will deepen understanding of unsteady flow in plate fuel assembly, which can be used in small-scale reactors.


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