Studies on pressure drop and heat Transfer characteristics of compact Plate fin heat exchangers

Abstract

A plate fin heat exchanger is a form of compact heat exchanger newlineconsisting of a block of alternating layers of corrugated fins and flat newlineseparators known as parting sheets They are widely used in aerospace newlineautomobile and cryogenic industries due to their compactness high heat newlinetransfer surface area to volume ratio for desired thermal performance newlineresulting in reduced space weight support structure footprint energy newlinerequirement and cost The literature review on this topic is summarized under newlinethree major sections They are non uniformity of the inlet fluid flow wavy fin newlinecharacteristics and offset fin characteristics newlineThe first part of the research work focuses on the pressure drop newlineanalysis for four types of compact plate fin heat exchangers In all the four newlineheat exchangers the additional pressure drop encountered due to the presence newlineof various bends at the inlet and outlet pipes that arise due to the space newlineconstraints in the aircraft are studied in detail by comparing the pressure drop newlinewithout considering the bends at the inlet and outlet pipes Experimental newlineinvestigations are carried out for pressure drop and thermal performance newlineanalysis on three types of heat exchangers to validate the CFD results In newlineaddition the flow non uniformity is estimated on one of the above four heat newlineexchangers newline newline