Experimental and Numerical Study of Heat Transfer and Pressure Loss in a Swirl Multi-pass Channel with Convergent Jet Slots

This paper presents a comparative experimental and numerical study of the heat transfer and pressure loss in a swirl multi-pass channel with tangential jet slots, and another baseline multi-pass channel with 180-deg U-bends as comparison baseline has also been investigated. Transient liquid crystal thermography is used to obtain the detailed heat transfer distribution on the internal surfaces of the multi-pass serpentine channels. The heat transfer patterns in the swirl multi-pass channel are quite different from that of the baseline multi-pass channel. Compared with the baseline multi-pass channel, the experimental globally averaged Nusselt number ratios of the last two passes in the swirl multi-pass channel can be increased by up to 82.9%, 104.8% and 124.6% for the Reynolds numbers 20,000, 40,000 and 60,000, respectively. The high and circumferentially uniform heat transfer is mainly due to the large-scale swirling flow induced by the tangential slots. More detailly, the large-scale swirling flow impinges onto the surface and further induces high tangential velocity near the wall, which destroys the boundary layer flow and thus improves the heat transfer rates at the wall. However, the notable pressure loss of the swirl multi-pass channel should be further controlled reasonably, which is about 5.4 times that of the baseline multi-pass channel. As supplements to the experiments, three-dimensional numerical computations provide more insights into the turbulent flow structure in the two kinds of multi-pass serpentine channels.

Effect of Cascade Surface Roughness on Boundary Layer Flow Under Variable Conditions

Under the influence of many factors, the surface roughness of the cascade will change during turbomachinery operation, which will affect the boundary layer flow of the cascade. In this article, the effects of cascade surface roughness on boundary layer flow under variable conditions are analyzed by experiments and numerical simulation. The results show that with the increase of roughness, the total pressure loss coefficient of the cascade decreases first and then increases. The larger the Reynolds number is, the greater the total pressure loss coefficient is, and the sensitive area of loss change is changed. In the sensitive area, the roughness has a greater influence on cascade loss. There are separation bubbles at the suction front edge of smooth cascades. With the increase of roughness, the degree of turbulence increases, and the transition process is accelerated. When the roughness is between 74 and 150 μm, the separation bubble disappears and the separation loss decreases. In conclusion, the aerodynamic loss of the cascade increases with the increase of roughness, and the cascade efficiency decreases. However, roughness can restrain the flow separation and reduce the separation loss. The two have gone through a process of one and the other. When the roughness is 74 μm, the displacement thickness, momentum thickness, and shape factor at the back of the cascade are the minimum.