Modeling of Scrap Dissolution in Molten Iron for the Case of Heat Transfer-Controlled Process by Different Approaches and Comparison of Their Accuracies

2019 ◽  
Vol 142 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ajay Kumar Shukla ◽  
Brahma Deo ◽  
D. G. C. Robertson

Abstract Dissolution of steel scrap in molten iron is studied by using analytical as well as numerical approaches for the case of a heat transfer-controlled process. The approaches used are Green's function approach, quasi-static approach, integral profile method (IPM) (with parabolic profile), and finite difference methods (FDM). Application of FDM explicit and FDM implicit with fixed grid and variable grid is described. Accuracy of all the approaches is compared in terms of total dissolution time evaluated from overall heat balance criterion. The selection rule of time step and deciding the suitable approach for achieving minimum error for different operating conditions, represented by nondimensional Biot number, are described in this paper.

Author(s):  
Piotr Łuczyński ◽  
Dennis Toebben ◽  
Manfred Wirsum ◽  
Wolfgang F. D. Mohr ◽  
Klaus Helbig

In recent decades, the rising share of commonly subsidized renewable energy especially affects the operational strategy of conventional power plants. In pursuit of flexibility improvements, extension of life cycle, in addition to a reduction in start-up time, General Electric has developed a product to warm-keep high/intermediate pressure steam turbines using hot air. In order to optimize the warm-keeping operation and to gain knowledge about the dominant heat transfer phenomena and flow structures, detailed numerical investigations are required. Considering specific warm-keeping operating conditions characterized by high turbulent flows, it is required to conduct calculations based on time-consuming unsteady conjugate heat transfer (CHT) simulations. In order to investigate the warm-keeping process as found in the presented research, single and multistage numerical turbine models were developed. Furthermore, an innovative calculation approach called the Equalized Timescales Method (ET) was applied for the modeling of unsteady conjugate heat transfer (CHT). The unsteady approach improves the accuracy of the stationary simulations and enables the determination of the multistage turbine models. In the course of the research, two particular input variables of the ET approach — speed up factor (SF) and time step (TS) — have been additionally investigated with regard to their high impact on the calculation time and the quality of the results. Using the ET method, the mass flow rate and the rotational speed were varied to generate a database of warm-keeping operating points. The main goal of this work is to provide a comprehensive knowledge of the flow field and heat transfer in a wide range of turbine warm-keeping operations and to characterize the flow patterns observed at these operating points. For varying values of flow coefficient and angle of incidence, the secondary flow phenomena change from well-known vortex systems occurring in design operation (such as passage, horseshoe and corner vortices) to effects typical for windage, like patterns of alternating vortices and strong backflows. Furthermore, the identified flow patterns have been compared to vortex systems described in cited literature and summarized in the so-called blade vortex diagram. The comparison of heat transfer in the form of charts showing the variation of the Nusselt-numbers with respect to changes in angle of incidence and flow coefficients at specific operating points is additionally provided.


2009 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 50
Author(s):  
R. L. L. Ribeiro ◽  
A. B. Mariano ◽  
E. Dilay ◽  
J. A. Souza ◽  
J. C. Ordonez ◽  
...  

A mathematical and computational modeling of a photobioreactor for the determination of the transient temperature behavior in compact tubular microalgae photobioreactors is presented. The model combines theoretical concepts of thermodynamics with classical theoretical and empirical correlations of Fluid Mechanics and Heat Transfer. The physical domain is discretized with the Volume Element Model (VEM) through which the physical system (reactor pipes) is divided into lumped volumes, such that only one time dependent ordinary differential equation, ODE, results for temperature, based on the first law of thermodynamics. The energetic interactions between the volumes are established through heat transfer empirical correlations for convection, conduction and radiation. Within this context, the main goal of this study is to present a numerical methodology to calculate the mixture (algae + water + nutrients) temperature inside the compact photobioreactor. A pilot plant is under construction, in the Center of Research and Development for Self-Sustainable Energy (NPDEAS), located at UFPR, and the experimental data obtained from this research unit will be used to validate the present numerical solution. Temperature is one of the most important parameters to be controlled in microalgae growth. Microalgae that are cultivated outside their growth temperature range may have a low growth rate or die. For this reason a numerical simulation of the system based on the operating conditions and environmental factors is desirable, in order to predict the transient algae growth temperature distribution along the reactor pipes. The VEM creates an “artificial” spatial dependence in the system or process under analysis by dividing the space (physical domain) into smaller sub domains, namely Volume Elements (VE). Each VE interacts with its neighbors by exchanging energy and/or mass. Thus, each VE is treated as a control volume from classical thermodynamics, i.e., with uniform properties and exchanging mass and energy with its neighbors. The problem is then formulated with the energy equation applied to the fluid VE and to the wall VE. These equations form a system of time dependent ODE’s, which are not dependent on space, therefore eliminating the need for the solution of a system of partial differential equations, PDE’s, depend on time and space, as is the case of traditional numerical methods (e.g., finite element, finite volume and finite differences). The resulting ODE’s were solved using a fourth order Runge-Kutta method with adaptive time step.


2001 ◽  
Vol 124 (1) ◽  
pp. 166-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
To Him Yu ◽  
Farshid Sadeghi

A numerical model was developed to study the thermal effects on the lubrication mechanism of radially-grooved thrust washers. A mass-conserving transient thermohydrodynamic (THD) analysis was performed by solving the modified Reynolds and energy equations for the lubricant pressure and temperature distributions. The heat transfer equations were also solved simultaneously to obtain the temperature fields of the solids (thrust washers). Due to different thermal time responses of the lubricant film and the solids, heat transfer equations of the runner and the thrust washer pad were treated as in quasi-steady state at each time step in the transient solution. Elrod cavitation algorithm was implemented to include lubricant cavitation. The results show that thermal effects do not only reduce load carrying capacity and the frictional torque but also increase side flow rate. Moreover, the numerical model also demonstrates that the thermal effects have greater influence on the load support when the groove depth and groove numbers increase. Furthermore, the analytical results also show that there exists certain operating conditions before thermal effects become the dominating factors in influencing the thrust washer performance.


Author(s):  
Giuseppe Starace ◽  
Lorenzo Falcicchia ◽  
Pierpaolo Panico ◽  
Maria Fiorentino ◽  
Gianpiero Colangelo

AbstractIn refrigeration systems, evaporative condensers have two main advantages compared to other condensation heat exchangers: They operate at lower condensation temperature than traditional air-cooled condensers and require a lower quantity of water and pumping power compared to evaporative towers. The heat and mass transfer that occur on tube batteries are difficult to study. The aim of this work is to apply an experimental approach to investigate the performance of an evaporative condenser on a reduced scale by means of a test bench, consisting of a transparent duct with a rectangular test section in which electric heaters, inside elliptical pipes (major axis 32 mm, minor axis 23 mm), simulate the presence of the refrigerant during condensation. By keeping the water conditions fixed and constant, the operating conditions of the air and the inclination of the heat transfer geometry were varied, and this allowed to carry out a sensitivity analysis, depending on some of the main parameters that influence the thermo-fluid dynamic phenomena, as well as a performance comparison. The results showed that the heat transfer increases with the tube surface exposed directly to the air as a result of the increase in their inclination, that has been varied in the range 0–20°. For the investigated conditions, the average increase, resulting by the inclination, is 28%.


1992 ◽  
Vol 114 (4) ◽  
pp. 847-857 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. H. Wagner ◽  
B. V. Johnson ◽  
R. A. Graziani ◽  
F. C. Yeh

Experiments were conducted to determine the effects of buoyancy and Coriolis forces on heat transfer in turbine blade internal coolant passages. The experiments were conducted with a large-scale, multipass, heat transfer model with both radially inward and outward flow. Trip strips on the leading and trailing surfaces of the radial coolant passages were used to produce the rough walls. An analysis of the governing flow equations showed that four parameters influence the heat transfer in rotating passages: coolant-to-wall temperature ratio, Rossby number, Reynolds number, and radius-to-passage hydraulic diameter ratio. The first three of these four parameters were varied over ranges that are typical of advanced gas turbine engine operating conditions. Results were correlated and compared to previous results from stationary and rotating similar models with trip strips. The heat transfer coefficients on surfaces, where the heat transfer increased with rotation and buoyancy, varied by as much as a factor of four. Maximum values of the heat transfer coefficients with high rotation were only slightly above the highest levels obtained with the smooth wall model. The heat transfer coefficients on surfaces where the heat transfer decreased with rotation, varied by as much as a factor of three due to rotation and buoyancy. It was concluded that both Coriolis and buoyancy effects must be considered in turbine blade cooling designs with trip strips and that the effects of rotation were markedly different depending upon the flow direction.


2018 ◽  
Vol 140 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Maffulli ◽  
L. He ◽  
P. Stein ◽  
G. Marinescu

The emerging renewable energy market calls for more advanced prediction tools for turbine transient operations in fast startup/shutdown cycles. Reliable numerical analysis of such transient cycles is complicated by the disparity in time scales of the thermal responses in fluid and solid domains. Obtaining fully coupled time-accurate unsteady conjugate heat transfer (CHT) results under these conditions would require to march in both domains using the time-step dictated by the fluid domain: typically, several orders of magnitude smaller than the one required by the solid. This requirement has strong impact on the computational cost of the simulation as well as being potentially detrimental to the accuracy of the solution due to accumulation of round-off errors in the solid. A novel loosely coupled CHT methodology has been recently proposed, and successfully applied to both natural and forced convection cases that remove these requirements through a source-term based modeling (STM) approach of the physical time derivative terms in the relevant equations. The method has been shown to be numerically stable for very large time steps with adequate accuracy. The present effort is aimed at further exploiting the potential of the methodology through a new adaptive time stepping approach. The proposed method allows for automatic time-step adjustment based on estimating the magnitude of the truncation error of the time discretization. The developed automatic time stepping strategy is applied to natural convection cases under long (2000 s) transients: relevant to the prediction of turbine thermal loads during fast startups/shutdowns. The results of the method are compared with fully coupled unsteady simulations showing comparable accuracy with a significant reduction of the computational costs.


Author(s):  
Tirivanhu Chinyoka ◽  
Daniel Oluwole Makinde

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the unsteady pressure-driven flow of a reactive third-grade non-Newtonian fluid in a channel filled with a porous medium. The flow is subjected to buoyancy, suction/injection asymmetrical and convective boundary conditions. Design/methodology/approach – The authors assume that exothermic chemical reactions take place within the flow system and that the asymmetric convective heat exchange with the ambient at the surfaces follow Newton’s law of cooling. The authors also assume unidirectional suction injection flow of uniform strength across the channel. The flow system is modeled via coupled non-linear partial differential equations derived from conservation laws of physics. The flow velocity and temperature are obtained by solving the governing equations numerically using semi-implicit finite difference methods. Findings – The authors present the results graphically and draw qualitative and quantitative observations and conclusions with respect to various parameters embedded in the problem. In particular the authors make observations regarding the effects of bouyancy, convective boundary conditions, suction/injection, non-Newtonian character and reaction strength on the flow velocity, temperature, wall shear stress and wall heat transfer. Originality/value – The combined fluid dynamical, porous media and heat transfer effects investigated in this paper have to the authors’ knowledge not been studied. Such fluid dynamical problems find important application in petroleum recovery.


Author(s):  
H. X. Liang ◽  
Q. W. Wang ◽  
L. Q. Luo ◽  
Z. P. Feng

Three-dimensional numerical simulation was conducted to investigate the flow field and heat transfer performance of the Cross-Wavy Primary Surface (CWPS) recuperators for microturbines. Using high-effective compact recuperators to achieve high thermal efficiency is one of the key techniques in the development of microturbine in recent years. Recuperators need to have minimum volume and weight, high reliability and durability. Most important of all, they need to have high thermal-effectiveness and low pressure-losses so that the gas turbine system can achieve high thermal performances. These requirements have attracted some research efforts in designing and implementing low-cost and compact recuperators for gas turbine engines recently. One of the promising techniques to achieve this goal is the so-called primary surface channels with small hydraulic dimensions. In this paper, we conducted a three-dimensional numerical study of flow and heat transfer for the Cross-Wavy Primary Surface (CWPS) channels with two different geometries. In the CWPS configurations the secondary flow is created by means of curved and interrupted surfaces, which may disturb the thermal boundary layers and thus improve the thermal performances of the channels. To facilitate comparison, we chose the identical hydraulic diameters for the above four CWPS channels. Since our experiments on real recuperators showed that the Reynolds number ranges from 150 to 500 under the operating conditions, we implemented all the simulations under laminar flow situations. By analyzing the correlations of Nusselt numbers and friction factors vs. Reynolds numbers of the four CWPS channels, we found that the CWPS channels have superior and comprehensive thermal performance with high compactness, i.e., high heat transfer area to volume ratio, indicating excellent commercialized application in the compact recuperators.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yong Xiao ◽  
Jianchun Guo ◽  
Hehua Wang ◽  
Lize Lu ◽  
John McLennan ◽  
...  

A coupled thermal-hydraulic-mechanical (THM) model is developed to simulate the combined effect of fracture fluid flow, heat transfer from the matrix to injected fluid, and shearing dilation behaviors in a coupled fracture-matrix hot volcanic reservoir system. Fluid flows in the fracture are calculated based on the cubic law. Heat transfer within the fracture involved is thermal conduction, thermal advection, and thermal dispersion; within the reservoir matrix, thermal conduction is the only mode of heat transfer. In view of the expansion of the fracture network, deformation and thermal-induced stress model are added to the matrix node’s in situ stress environment in each time step to analyze the stability of the matrix. A series of results from the coupled THM model, induced stress, and matrix stability indicate that thermal-induced aperture plays a dominant role near the injection well to enhance the conductivity of the fracture. Away from the injection well, the conductivity of the fracture is contributed by shear dilation. The induced stress has the maximum value at the injection point; the deformation-induced stress has large value with smaller affected range; on the contrary, thermal-induced stress has small value with larger affected range. Matrix stability simulation results indicate that the stability of the matrix nodes may be destroyed; this mechanism is helpful to create complex fracture networks.


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