Natural convection heat transfer in a partially divided trapezoidal enclosure

Abstract

Natural convection heat transfer in a partially divided trapezoidal enclosure is studied numerically using the control volume method. Summer and winter conditions are separately examined by imposing regarding thermal boundary conditions. A horizontal divider included and its two different placements are considered. It is shown that heat transfer results are not significantly altered by the presence of the divider for summer condition. For winter condition, on the other hand, decrement in heat loss and effect on the flow and the temperature fields by the presence and the placement of the divider are observed, respectively. As a horizontal divider is placed to oppose buoyancy, the flow strength becomes weaker and formation of two separate levels of temperature uniformity occurs. As the divider is placed to assist buoyancy, the flow gets stronger and tends to form relatively uniform temperature field within whole enclosure.

Numerical study of flow and heat transfer in differentially heated enclosures

“…Furthermore, there are wide disagreements among correlations and lack of information even for simpler configurations of horizontal or vertical layers, as will be shown later. Relevant and practical studies can be found in literature [13][14][15][16]. Figure 1 shows the geometry of the present numerical study.…”

Effects of porosity and heat generation on free convection in a porous trapezoidal cavity

“…Lam et al [1], presented experimental and numerical studies of free convection in trapezoidal enclosures constructed of two vertical isolated side walls, a horizontal hot bottom wall and an inclined cold top wall. Arici and Sahin [2] numerically investigated the natural convection in a partially divided trapezoidal enclosure by using the control volume method. The investigation is done for two different placements of a divider to gether with a non-divider enclosure.…”