PRELIMINARY DEVELOPMENT OF A CONCEPTUAL MODEL OF MATRIX HEAT EXCHANGER

While the basic principles of thermodynamics have remained the same, the necessity for heat exchangers to have good effectiveness in a small volume is constantly growing. Heat exchangers type Matrix Heat Exchanger (MHE), which can meet these requirements, does not have an optimal design variant for its use. These heat exchangers have been approached for 60 years, by many researchers, currently offering only an overview of the process. The mechanism of heat transfer in a matrix heat exchanger is complex, having three different thermal convection paths as well as thermal conduction through two different surfaces. This paper presents the simulations performed in ANSYS Workbench, combining all these heat transfer modes, for developing an optimal model of a perforated plate matrix heat exchanger, used for the pre-cooling of a hydrogen isotopes stream mixture, for purification purposes, as well as, for preparing the inlet temperature in cryogenic distillation columns of hydrogen isotopes.

Numerical Modeling of Heat and Mass Transport with Inner Heat Exchange in Unsaturated Porous Media

We are focused to the numerical modelling of heat, contaminant and water transport in unsaturated porous media in 3D. The heat exchange between water and porous media matrix is taken into the account. The determination of heat energy transmission coefficient and matrix heat conductivity is solved by means of inverse problem methods. The mathematical model represents the conservation of heat, contaminant and water mass balance. It is expressed by coupled non-linear system of parabolic-elliptic equations. Mathematical model for water transport in unsaturated porous media is represented by Richard's type equation. Heat transport by water includes water flux, molecular diffusion and dispersion. A successful experiment scenario is suggested to determine the required parameters including heat transmission and matrix heat conductivity coefficients. Additionally we investigate contaminant transport with heat transmission and contaminant adsorption. The obtained experiments support our method suitable for solution of direct and inverse problems. This problem we have discussed previously in 1D model, but preferential streamlines in 1D thin tubes shadow accurate results in determination of required parameters. In our presented setting we consider a cylindrical sample which is suitable in laboratory experiments for inverse problems.

Experimental and numerical investigation of thermal and fluid-flow processes in a matrix heat exchanger

The need for compact heat exchangers has led to the development of many types of surfaces that enhance the rate of heat transfer, among them the matrix heat exchangers. These heat exchangers consist of a series of perforated plates mutually separated and sealed by spacers. The goal of this research was to investigate the heat transfer process of matrix heat exchangers on the air side, at the close to ambient conditions. The research was conducted in two directions ? experimental research and CFD research. The experimental investigation was carried out over a perforated plate package with the porosity of 25.6%. The air/water matrix heat exchanger was heated by hot water and was installed in an experimental chamber at which entrance was a fan with the variable flow rate and heated by hot water. The thermocouples were attached to the surface of the perforated plate at the upwind and downwind sides, as well as at the inlet and the outlet of the chamber. During each experiment, the thermocouple readings and the air and water-flow and temperatures were recorded. In the numerical part of the research, the matrix heat exchangers with different plate porosity from 10 to 50% were investigated. The results of the numerical simulations were validated against the experimental results. On the basis of the experimental and numerical results, equations for heat transfer as the function of Reynolds number and geometrical parameters was established.

Material Distribution Optimization in a Metal Matrix Heat Sink Using a Constructal-Design Inspired Unit T-Cell

Constructal principles are used to investigate the optimization of material utilization in a metal matrix heat sink that maximizes the total heat transfer rate through the base of heat sink. This approach utilizes a two-dimensional geometry to examine spatial heat flow and optimal material distribution in a metal matrix in the plane perpendicular to the coolant flow direction. The matrix is composed of multiple layers of conductive tees built up from the smallest constituent, the unit T-cell. The unit cell consists of a conductive tee-shaped geometry with the two rectangular void regions each making up half of a cooling channel. The horizontal boundaries must match the temperature and heat flux at the boundaries of the neighboring unit cells as this is a conjugate conduction/convection problem. The geometry of the unit cell is characterized by aspect ratios of channel width to height, overall cell width to height, and channel height to cell height. The matrix structure is assembled by stacking unit cells into multiple layers where the number of cells in each layer is an integer multiple of the cells contained in the lower layer. The solution is obtained for optimal T-cell geometric parameters under a set of predetermined constraints including overall volume, solid fill fraction, and number of layers. When a large number of stacked unit cells are considered, the results describe the ideal spatial distribution of porosity and pore sizes for two dimensional functionally graded metal-matrix heat sink. These results will lead to a better understanding of the role played by the porosity distribution in a metal-matrix heat sink and may be applied to the analysis, optimization, and design of more effective heat sinks.

Comparison of stationary and rotary matrix heat exchangers using teaching-learning-based optimization algorithm

In this paper, two kinds of compact heat exchanger including plate fin heat exchanger and rotary regenerator, respectively the stationary and rotary matrix heat exchanger, are compared. For this purpose, both heat exchangers are optimized by considering three simultaneous objective functions including effectiveness, heat exchanger volume, and total pressure drop using multi-objective teaching learning based optimization algorithm. Six different design parameters are considered for the both plate fin heat exchanger and rotary regenerator. Optimization is performed for the same and different hot and cold side mass flow rates. The optimum results reveal 13.26% growth in the effectiveness, 475.17% increase in the volume, and 95.45% reduction in the pressure drop in RR as compared with plate fin heat exchanger and for the final optimum point. As a result, rotary regenerator is more suitable in the case of high effectiveness and low pressure drop while plate fin heat exchanger is more suitable in the case of space limitation (lower heat exchanger volume).