High resolution X-ray microtomography-based CFD simulation for the characterization of flow permeability and effective thermal conductivity of aluminum metal foams

Thermal and permeability properties of metal aluminum foams for functional applications

“…Recently, numeric methods (Finite Elements Method [FEM]) were used to predict the permeability of aluminum foams with 80% porosity, achieving a permeability value of 7.8×10 -7 m 2 [31]. This conforms to the results reported by Ranut et al for foams with porosity percentages between 87% and 98% [18]. This bolsters the finding that permeability increases as the porosity percentage increases.…”

“…The following three principles are important in the use of interconnected pore metals in heat exchangers: i) high conductivity struts (cell borders) that are highly conductive, preferably metals such as copper or aluminum, ii) a turbulent flow to facilitate local transference of the solid surface heat to the fluid [17] and, iii) low pressure between the input and output, forcing the fluid out of the medium with a moderate strength pumping system [18]- [21]. There is a growing demand for compact, strong and lightweight systems for heat transfer removal devices that are focused on open porosity metal foams as the ideal candidates [22]- [24].…”

On the effective thermal conductivity of aluminum metal foams: Review and improvement of the available empirical and analytical models

“…At the moment, a significant effort is devoted to describing the foam structure in a more realistic way: from this perspective, X-ray computed microtomography (μ-CT) appears a promising and appealing approach to be coupled to numerical simulations. The literature includes several works dealing with μ-CT, not only limited to metal foams or thermal conductivity estimations [1,3,[13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45]. The literature offers a wide set of analytical and empirical correlations for the estimation of the effective thermal conductivity of metal foams.…”

Numerical study of effective heat conductivities of foams by coupled conduction and radiation

“…Many geometries have been analyzed: arrangements of cubes with or without spherical holes [27], hexagonal cells [28], fiber assemblies [29,30], symmetrical interconnected network of fibers and cavities [31] [38] extracted an equivalent resistance network from a scan and solved quasi-analytically the associated transfer problem. FE computations have also been conducted [39] ; agreement with experimental determinations has been obtained [40].…”