Numerical investigation on the effect of fin design on the melting of phase change material in a horizontal shell and tube thermal energy storage

Mahood, Hameed B.; Mahdi, Mustafa S.; Monjezi, Alireza Abbassi; Khadom, Anees A.; Campbell, Alasdair N.

doi:10.1016/j.est.2020.101331

Cited by 75 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Kazemi et al 54 claimed an improvement in the melting rate by arranging the rectangular fins in the region below the HTF surface. Recently, Mahood et al 67 showed significant reduction in the melting time when the rectangular fin height increases from 0.2Rh to 0.8Rh, where Rh represents the hydraulic diameter. In view of this, in the present investigation, the appropriate fin height is incorporated to expedite the melting process.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Several authors have embedded longitudinal fins around the HTF for enhancement in the charging and discharging process. Several authors have evaluated the thermal performance of different latent heat storage systems using rectangular fins 47‐67 . A few authors have also investigated the charging and discharging performance of the PCM using triangular/branched (tree/Y‐shaped) fins 57,68‐73 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Enrichment of heat transfer in a latent heat storage unit using longitudinal fins

et al. 2020

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The charging and discharging rates of a phase change material (PCM) in a horizontal latent heat storage unit (LHSU) is largely influenced by the lower thermal conductivity of the PCM. In the present research, four different configurations of longitudinal fins are proposed to augment the heat transfer in horizontal shell and tube type LHSUs. Numerical investigations are reported to establish the thermal performance augmentation with rectangular, triangular, and Y‐shaped (bifurcated) fins. From the results, it has been inferred that all fin configurations provide a faster charging and discharging rate. In the present set of geometric dimensions of LHSU considered, a reduction in charging time of 68.71% is evaluated for case III (three rectangular fins with one fin positioned in the area of the heat transfer fluid [HTF] surface) and case V (two bifurcated fins with one fin positioned in the area of the HTF surface). Moreover, overall cycle (charging + discharging) time is reduced by 58.3% for case III. Employment of fins results in a faster rate of absorption and extraction of energy from the PCM.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enrichment of heat transfer in a latent heat storage unit using longitudinal fins

et al. 2020

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“…The liquid PCM is an incompressible Newtonian fluid, and the flow form is unsteady laminar flow. 39 The volume expansion of PCM during melting process is ignored. The thermophysical properties of PCM are independent of temperature.…”

Section: Governing Equationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thermal management performance improvement of phase change material for autonomous underwater vehicles' battery module by optimizing fin design based on quantitative evaluation method

Mao

Song

et al. 2022

Intl J of Energy Research

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Summary Efficient thermal management of lithium battery modules has become a thorny problem in the development of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), especially under high current discharge. In this article, the fin/phase change material (PCM) composite structure was proposed for AUV's battery thermal management with consideration of natural convection. The temperature behavior of the battery and the melting behavior of PCM were investigated under different key parameters. In addition, the heat transfer mechanism of the melting process of the PCM was revealed. More importantly, the dimensionless temperature control performance (TCP) factor and the dimensionless heat storage performance (HSP) factor were introduced as new criteria to quantitatively evaluate the impact of different design parameters on the battery thermal management performance. The results showed that utilizing fins can significantly accelerate the melting of the PCM. Increasing the number of fins can reduce the temperature of the battery and improve the uniformity of the battery temperature distribution. Compared with the pure PCM, the total time required for PCM melting in the fin/PCM battery thermal management unit with different numbers of fins is reduced by at least 11.5%. The decrease of the time of complete PCM melting is not linearly correlated with the length ratio of fins. The fin number of N = 6, length ratio of R = 0.8, and angle between fins of φ = 36° were identified as the optimal parameters of fin/PCM composite structures. The TCP and HSP were enhanced by 38.1% and 4.54%, respectively. The conclusions of this work can provide reference for the accurate design of fin/PCM composite structures for the thermal management of AUV batteries. Highlights The fin/phase change material composite structure was introduced for autonomous underwater vehicles' battery thermal management. The temperature and melting behavior were investigated with natural convection. The temperature control performance factor and heat storage performance factor were proposed as new evaluation criteria. Temperature deviation index was used to measure the battery temperature uniformity. The performance was enhanced by optimizing the design parameters of fin.

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“…On the other hand, lowering the fin position would result in non-uniform temperature distribution during the solidification process. Mahood [20] numerically investigated the thermal performance during the melting process for RT-50 in a horizontal latent heat thermal energy storage unit with a view to optimizing the fin configuration. The average temperature of the PCM, its liquid fraction, and velocity distribution during the melting process were investigated.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comprehensive Study on Melting Process of Phase Change Material by Using Paraffin Coupled Finned Heating Plate for Heat Transfer Enhancement

2022

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Paraffin is a low-temperature phase change material, which is often used to recover and store heat in a solar thermal utilization system. This study aims to reveal the development and migration law of paraffin melting interface with time under the influence of a finned heating plate, as well as the heat transfer mechanism, and obtain the ways and methods to enhance the heat transfer in phase change material through visual experiments and numerical simulation. The research shows that once the paraffin with a high liquid fraction connects the mushy zone between the fin and the top wall, the vortexes in the mushy zone increases rapidly, which enhances the natural convective heat transfer in it, resulting in the rapid increase of liquid fraction. The lower the position of the fin, the longer the time required to form a mushy zone with a high liquid fraction between the fin and the top wall, and the later the phenomenon of rapid increase of liquid fraction occurs. Compared with changing the fin position, increasing the fin length has a greater effect on the paraffin melting rate. When other conditions remain unchanged, the inclination of fin and the effective length of fin in the horizontal direction jointly determine the melting rate of paraffin. The melting effect of paraffin is the best when the fin is inclined upward by 15°.

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Numerical investigation on the effect of fin design on the melting of phase change material in a horizontal shell and tube thermal energy storage

Cited by 75 publications

References 31 publications

Enrichment of heat transfer in a latent heat storage unit using longitudinal fins

Enrichment of heat transfer in a latent heat storage unit using longitudinal fins

Thermal management performance improvement of phase change material for autonomous underwater vehicles' battery module by optimizing fin design based on quantitative evaluation method

Comprehensive Study on Melting Process of Phase Change Material by Using Paraffin Coupled Finned Heating Plate for Heat Transfer Enhancement

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