Heat transfer, pressure drop, and economic analysis of a tube with a constant temperature equipped with semi-circular and teardrop-shaped turbulators

• Published in: Case studies in thermal engineering 2022-05, Vol.33, p.101955, Article 101955
• Main Authors: Fang, Yuan, Mansir, Ibrahim B., Shawabkeh, Ali, Mohamed, Abdullah, Emami, Faezeh
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Economic analysis; Heat transfer; Pressure drop; Semi-circular turbulator; Teardrop-shaped turbulator
• ISSN: 2214-157X; 2214-157X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.csite.2022.101955

The effect of using innovative turbulator geometry, such as semi-circular and teardrop-shaped turbulators, on heat transfer and pressure drop has been studied for the first time in this study. To this end, eight different geometries have been considered for turbulator in a tube with constant surface temperature. Then, some tests have been performed for different hot water flow rates (mh˙) in the range of 0.044–0.099 kg/s. Also, the optimization was performed using the thermal enhancement factor (TEF) and the net profit of unit transferred heat load (ηp). These kind of turbulators have a major impact on heat transfer and friction factor, according to the findings. The maximum heat transfer values for semi-circular and teardrop-shaped turbulators were respectively 257% and 298% higher than that of the plain tube. Base on the results, a tube with teardrop-shaped inserts (case C) is the optimum case.