Optimization of Finned-Tube Heat Exchanger in a Gravity-Assisted Separated Heat Pipe

Finned-tube heat exchanger(FTHE)is often used as an evaporator in commercial products of separated heat pipe(SHP).The working conditions of FTHE in gravity-assisted SHP are significantly different from those working in refrigerators and air conditioners.Although FTHE is widely used in commercial products of SHP,previous research on its characteristics is very limited.In this paper,a mathematical model for a SHP with FTHE as the evaporator and plate heat exchanger as the condenser is established and verified with experiments.Parametric analyses are carried out to investigate the influences of evaporator design parameters:air inlet velocity,number of tube rows,tube diameter,and fin pitch.With the increasing of air velocity,number of tube rows and tube diameter,and the decreasing of fin pitch,the heat transfer rate increases,while the energy efficiency ratio(EER)decreases monotonically.Using the total cost of the ten-year life cycle as the performance index,the structure parameters of the evaporator with a given heat transfer rate are optimized by the method of orthogonal experimental design.It is found that the total cost can differ as large as nearly ten times between groups.Among the three factors investigated,the number of tube rows has a significant impact on the total cost of the evaporator.With more tube rows,the total cost will be less.The impacts of fin pitch and tube diameter are insignificant.These results are of practical importance for the engineering design of FTHE in gravity-assisted SHP.

Decoupled thermal–hydraulic analysis of an air-cooled separated heat pipe for spent fuel pools under natural convection

An investigation of the decoupled thermal–hydraulic analysis of a separated heat pipe spent fuel pool passive cooling system(SFS)is essential for practical engineering applications.Based on the principles of thermal and mass balance,this study decoupled the heat transfer processes in the SFS.In accordance with the decoupling conditions,we modeled the spent fuel pool of the CAP1400 pressurized water reactor in Weihai and used computational fluid dynamics to explore the heat dissipation capacity of the SFS under different air temperatures and wind speeds.The results show that the air-cooled separated heat pipe radiator achieved optimal performance at an air temperature of 10℃ or wind speed of 8 m/s.Fitted equations for the equivalent thermal conductivity of the separated heat pipes with the wind speed and air temperature we obtained according to the thermal resistance network model.This study is instructive for the actual operation of an SFS.

Optimal design of the separate type heat pipe heat exchanger

Separate type heat pipe heat exchangers are often used for large-scale heat exchanging. The arrangement of such a heat exchanger conveniently allows heat input to and output from the heat exchanger at remote locations. The traditional method of designing an ordinary HPHE (heat pipe heat exchanger) is commonly applied in the separate type exchanger design, but the calculations have to be carried out separately, which makes it very complicated. In this work, the ε-NTU (effectiveness-Number of Transfer Units) method was applied for optimization analysis of single- or multi-level separate type heat pipe heat exchangers. An optimizing formula for single-level separate type heat pipe heat exchangers was obtained. The optimizing principles of effec- tiveness-NTU and heat transfer rate by the equal distribution method for multi-level separate type heat pipe heat exchanger are presented. The design of separate type heat pipe heat exchangers by the optimizing method is more convenient and faster than by the traditional method.

Entransy dissipation analysis and optimization of separated heat pipe system

Seperated heat pipe systems are widely used in the fields of waste heat recovery and air conditioning due to their high heat transfer capability,and optimization of heat transfer process plays an important role in high-efficiency energy utilization and energy conservation.In this paper,the entransy dissipation analysis is conducted for the separated heat pipe system,and the result indicates that minimum thermal resistance principle is applicable to the optimization of the separated heat pipe system.Whether in the applications of waste heat recovery or air conditioning,the smaller the entransy-dissipation-based thermal re-sistance of the separated heat pipe system is,the better the heat transfer performance will be.Based on the minimum thermal resistance principle,the optimal area allocation relationship between evaporator and condenser is deduced,which is numeri-cally verified in the optimation design of separated heat pipe system.

Prediction of oil-water flow patterns, radial distribution of volume fraction, pressure and velocity during separated flows in horizontal pipe

Flow of two immiscible fluids gives rise to variety of flow patterns,which influence transportation process.In this work,we present detailed analysis on the prediction of flow pattern maps and radial distribution of volume fraction,pressure and velocity of a pair of immiscible liquids through a horizontal pipeline by computational fluid dynamics（CFD） simulation using ANSYS FLUENT 6.3.Moderately viscous oil and water have been taken as the fluid pair for study.Volume of fluid（VOF） method has been employed to predict various flow patterns by assuming unsteady flow,immiscible liquid pair,constant liquid properties,and co-axial flow.From the grid independent study,we have selected 47 037 number of quadrilateral mesh elements for the entire geometry.Simulation successfully predicts almost all the flow patterns（viz.,plug,slug,stratified wavy,stratified mixed and annular）,except dispersion of oil in water and dispersion of water in oil.The simulated results are validated with experimental results of oil volume fraction and flow pattern map.Radial distribution of volume fraction,pressure and velocity profiles describe the nature of the stratified wavy,stratified mixed and annular flow pattern.These profiles help to developing the phenomenological correlations of interfacial characteristics in two-phase flow.