Experimental Study of Thermal Bubble Pump

Abstract

In this study, a numerical investigation hasbeen carried out for single phase flow behavior for thirty sixinternally finned tubes to demonstrate the effect of axial pitchto fin height ratio (p/e) for 0.8≤p/e≤6.345, helix angle ofinternal fins (β) for 30°≤β≤70°, apex angle of internal fins (α)for 0°≤α≤53.13°, internal fin height (e) for 0.6mm≤e≤1.0mm,internal tube diameter (di) with 14 mm and Reynolds number(Re) of single phase flow for 10000≤Re≤50000 on enhancementof forced convection heat transfer and reduction of frictionfactor by using ANSYS CFX program. It solves the threedimensionalNavier-Stokes equations for steady state turbulentwith SST model and enhance wall treatment. The numericalanalysis provided at fully developed velocity and temperature.Numerical results showed that the smallest axial pitch to finheight ratio (p/e) =0.8 and with apex angle α=10 degreeprovided enhancement of heat transfer of 2.8 to 3.55 timeshigher than of smooth tube. Finally, present numerical resultsare seen to be in good agreement with literature experimentalcorrelations.