Parametric Analysis of Heat Exchanger Thermal Performance in Complex Geometries-Effect of Air Velocity and Water Flow Distributions

Authors

Mahmoud Khaled
Mohamad Ramadan
Ali Shaito
Hicham El Hage
Fabien Harambat
Hassan Peerhossaini

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2016

Journal

HEAT TRANSFER ENGINEERING

Volume

37

Issue

12

First Page

1027

URL with Digital Object Identifier

https://doi.org/10.1080/01457632.2015.1104166

Last Page

1037

Abstract

The thermal performance of automotive heat exchangers is greatly affected by the relationship that binds the nonuniformities in flow velocity and the distribution of upstream temperatures. Consequently, an in-house two-dimensional code is established to evaluate the thermal performance based on known parameters, namely, distribution of upstream velocity of an air-liquid heat exchanger, the flow rate of heat exchanger liquid, and the inlet air and liquid temperatures. A parametric research study is then performed to confirm the relation between the thermal performance of the heat exchanger and these different parameters. It was observed that nonuniformities in air velocity and water flow distributions decrease the thermal performance of a heat exchanger by up to 33 and 42%, respectively.