Numerical study of periodically turbulent flow and heat transfer in a channel with transverse fin arrays

Abstract

A numerical study has been conducted for the characteristics of the periodically fully developed turbulent flow and heat transfer in a channel with transverse opposite‐positioned fins. The Reynolds number range is 2 × 10⁴ to 7 × 10⁴. K‐ε model and wall function method were adopted during the calculation. The influence of the thermal boundary condition of the fin to the heat transfer has been verified. For the studied configuration the prominent feature that differs from the similar laminar heat transfer is the phenomenon of secondary peak of the Nusselt number distribution. Assessment of heat transfer enhancement under the constraint of the same pump power reveals that the effect of the configuration of the relative fin height, e/H, equal to 0.1 is superior to those of e/H equal to 0.15 and 0.2. Comparing with the results of the channel with rod disturbances, the studied configuration possesses nearly the same heat transfer enhancement effect. Transient simulations to cases with big fin have also been conducted to assure the validity of the steady algorithm.

Citation

Yuan, Z.X. (2000), "Numerical study of periodically turbulent flow and heat transfer in a channel with transverse fin arrays", International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat & Fluid Flow, Vol. 10 No. 8, pp. 842-861. https://doi.org/10.1108/09615530010359139