No abstract

In this article, a 3D numerical simulation for investigating friction factor and heat transfer enhancements in case of inserting normal or perforated dual twisted tapes (TTs) in converging‐diverging tubes (CDTs) is presented. The effects of Reynolds number changing from 10,000 to 20,000 and a various number of holes (N = 0, 1, 2, and 3) in TTs, under constant uniform heat flux on tube outer wall and using water as working fluid circumstances, were examined. It was found that generally using dual TTs in CDTs improves the Nusselt number up to 9% compared to bare CDTs. Perforating TTs do not have a noticeable effect on heat transfer, but decrease the friction factor significantly, up to 396% compared to normal dual TT implantation, in higher Reynolds numbers. Following that, thermal performance factor considerably increases up to 57%, compared to CDTs with normal dual TTs. To show the mechanism of these effects, velocity streamlines are presented and will be discussed in this paper.

In this paper, a numerical investigation is presented on heat transfer augmenting by using various kinds of modified multiple twisted tape inserted in solar parabolic trough collectors. The pressurized water is considered as working fluid and Reynolds number varying from 10000 to 20000. The received heat flux on the solar absorber was assumed non-uniform due to hemispheric insolation of sun. The obtained numerical results for the Nusselt number, friction factor and thermal performance are presented for each cases. Various types of twisted tape including single twisted tape, normal, perforated, center-cleared, square, and V-cut dual twisted tape are considered and analyzed. The numerical simulations are performed by a commercial CFD code, ANSYS FLUENT 18.2. The obtained results revealed that at Re=10000 and 20000, the average Nusselt numbers of case with dual v-cut twisted tapes are more than plaine tube by 19.58 and 17.44%, respectively. Moreover, thermal performance of all cases with various twisted tapes is larger than 1 which means that utilizing twisted tape with various configurations leads to more thermal performance than plain tube. The thermal performances of case with dual square-cut twisted tapes (as the best case) for Re=10000 and 20000 are more than plain tube by about 16 and 12% improvement, respectively. Furthermore, for the case with perforated dual twisted tape (as the case with lowest thermal performance), the thermal performances for Re=10000 and 20000 are more than plain tube by about 9.2 and 7% improvement, respectively.

Due to the high enthalpy of fusion in water, ice storage systems are known as one of the best cold thermal energy storage systems. The phase change material used in these systems is water, thus it is inexpensive, accessible, and completely eco-friendly. However, despite the numerous advantages of these systems, the phase change process in them is time-consuming and this leads to difficulties in their practical application. To solve this problem, the addition of nanomaterials can be helpful. This study aims to investigate the compound heat transfer enhancement of a cylindrical-shaped unit equipped with double helically coiled coolant tubes using connecting plates and nano additives as heat transfer augmentation methods. Complex three-dimensional numerical simulations are carried out here to assess the best heat exchanger material as well as the impact of various nanoparticle types, including alumina, copper oxide, and titania, and their concentrations in the PCM side of the ice storage unit. The influence of these parameters is discussed on the charging rate and the temperature evolution factor in these systems. The results suggest that using nano additives, as well as the connecting plates, together is a promising way to enhance the solidification rate by up to 29.9%.

Nowadays electrical power is one of the most vital requirements for daily life and industries. Since with the rise of the human population, providing electrical energy is an important challenge, some methods should be used to reduce the electrical demand or shift the demand from peak-hours to off-peak hours. Ice storage systems are one of the devices which can be used for this purpose. In this article, a transient 3D numerical simulation was carried out to investigate the effects of two geometrical parameters of double helical coil heat exchanger in the charging process of an ice storage system with the volume of 15 L. These parameters were helical coil pitch length and the distance between inner and outer coils. The results indicated that with higher values for pitch length and inner and outer coils distance, compared to smallest values for these parameters, the distribution of formed ice in the storage improves and the rate of ice formation increases by 22.81% and 13.99%, respectively. Increasing these values can also retard the ice block formation which is an undesirable phenomenon in the external discharge process of the ice storage systems.

A vehicle radiator is used for cooling down the hot working fluid with airflow passing over its flow passages and fins.The proper design of the radiator is very important due to space and weight limitations in automobiles. In this study, a numerical investigation has been conducted on the improvements, which can be obtained by implementing different porous fins in the radiator channels.The effects of different porous fin configurations with the same porous media volume on the heat transfer rate and pressure drop were investigated. The coefficient of performance values were presented for evaluating the overall performance. The investigated geometries included horizontal, vertical, corrugated, and wavy-corrugated configurations. The results showed that the corrugated pattern had the best thermal performance among these geometries while the horizontal configuration presented the lowest pressure loss, even though the best overall performance belonged to wavy-corrugated configuration. After selecting this configuration, the influence of different porous materials on the radiator performance was studied. Finally, the radiator with the optimum porous media configuration and material was compared to a conventional radiator. It was found that implementing this porous media in the radiator channels improves its overall thermal performance factor up to 237%. K E Y W O R D Sheat exchanger, heat transfer enhancement, porous media, pressure drop, thermal performance, vehicle radiator

No abstract

Generating a high startup torque is a critical factor for the application of small wind turbines in regions with low wind speed. In the present study, the blades of a small wind turbine were designed and optimized to maximize the output power and startup torque. For this purpose, the chord length and the twist angle were considered as design variables, and a multi-objective optimization study was used to assess the optimal blade geometry. The blade element momentum (BEM) technique was used to calculate the design goals and the genetic algorithm was utilized to perform the optimization. The BEM method and the optimization tools were verified with wind tunnel test results of the base turbine and Schmitz equations, respectively. The results showed that from the aerodynamic viewpoint, the blade of a small wind turbine can be divided into two sections: r/R < 0.52, which is responsible for generating the startup torque, and r/R ≥ 0.52, where most of the turbine power is generated. By increasing the chord length and twist angle (especially chord length) in the r/R < 0.52 section and following the ideal chord length and twist angle distributions in the r/R ≥ 0.52 part, a 140% rise in the startup torque of the designed blade was observed with only a 1.5% reduction in power coefficient, compared with the base blade. Thereby, the startup wind speed was reduced from 6 m/s for the base blade to 4 m/s for the designed blade, which provides greater possibilities for the operation of this turbine in areas with lower wind speeds.