LES Simulation and Experimental Measurement of Fully Developed Ribbed Channel Flow and Heat Transfer

Author(s):  
Kazunori Watanabe ◽  
Toshihiko Takahashi

Ribbed channel flow is adopted for internal cooling of a 1300 °C class gas turbine first stage rotor blade. Heat transfer characteristics of transverse ribbed channel flow were examined using LES (Large Eddy Simulations) and by experiments. The flow was examined over the range of Reynolds number around 105 that are closer to the actual engine conditions. Computational results agreed reasonably well with experimental results. Heat transfer enhancement mechanism in a ribbed channel flow was shown to be caused by advecting eddy structure and interference of a rib.

2013 ◽  
Vol 135 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sunil Patil ◽  
Danesh Tafti

Large eddy simulations of flow and heat transfer in a square ribbed duct with rib height to hydraulic diameter of 0.1 and 0.05 and rib pitch to rib height ratio of 10 and 20 are carried out with the near wall region being modeled with a zonal two layer model. A novel formulation is used for solving the turbulent boundary layer equation for the effective tangential velocity in a generalized co-ordinate system in the near wall zonal treatment. A methodology to model the heat transfer in the zonal near wall layer in the large eddy simulations (LES) framework is presented. This general approach is explained for both Dirichlet and Neumann wall boundary conditions. Reynolds numbers of 20,000 and 60,000 are investigated. Predictions with wall modeled LES are compared with the hydrodynamic and heat transfer experimental data of (Rau et al. 1998, “The Effect of Periodic Ribs on the Local Aerodynamic and Heat Transfer Performance of a Straight Cooling Channel,”ASME J. Turbomach., 120, pp. 368–375). and (Han et al. 1986, “Measurement of Heat Transfer and Pressure Drop in Rectangular Channels With Turbulence Promoters,” NASA Report No. 4015), and wall resolved LES data of Tafti (Tafti, 2004, “Evaluating the Role of Subgrid Stress Modeling in a Ribbed Duct for the Internal Cooling of Turbine Blades,” Int. J. Heat Fluid Flow 26, pp. 92–104). Friction factor, heat transfer coefficient, mean flow as well as turbulent statistics match available data closely with very good accuracy. Wall modeled LES at high Reynolds numbers as presented in this paper reduces the overall computational complexity by factors of 60–140 compared to resolved LES, without any significant loss in accuracy.


Author(s):  
Prateek Sharma ◽  
Bittagopal Mondal ◽  
Gautam Biswas

In order to improve the efficiency of the gas turbines and power plants, researchers have aimed to reach higher turbine inlet temperatures. There is always a metallurgical limit for highest temperature, as the materials pertaining to turbine cannot withstand very high temperature due to change in material properties. Deformation, creeping and even melting of turbine blades may occur. To alleviate these, researchers have been trying to evolve the cooling systems for turbine blades. Two major cooling strategies involve (a) external cooling and (b) internal cooling. In case of internal cooling, a layer of air or some coolant is made to flow through small passages inside the blade. Both the systems remove heat from the blade and keep the blade temperature under the metallurgical limit. The present work is aimed at modeling the internal cooling passages of the gas turbine blades. The same geometry can throw light on the performance of cooling passages used in electronic devices. Taking these two applications into consideration, it becomes necessary to study flow and heat transfer past bluff-bodies and in ribbed channels. In the present work, the fluid flow behavior and heat transfer characteristics in a rectangular channel with staggered ribs mounted on both walls are analyzed using the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM). This study is carried out for the fluid with Prandtl number Pr = 0.7 and a wide range of Reynolds numbers (10 ≤ Re ≤ 120). The computational strategy is applied in various test cases and validated with the results reported in the literature. The unsteady flow behaviors, such as, instantaneous streamlines, vortex shedding frequency and phase plots are reported. For the ribbed channel (with staggered ribs), the heat transfer is predicted with the help of isotherms, local Nusselt number distribution and average Nusselt number.


Author(s):  
Cody Dowd ◽  
Danesh Tafti

The focus of this research is to predict the flow and heat transfer in a rotating two-pass duct geometry with staggered ribs using Large-Eddy Simulations (LES). The geometry consists of a U-Bend with 17 ribs in each pass. The ribs are staggered with an e/Dh = 0.1 and P/e = 10. LES is performed at a Reynolds number of 100,000, a rotation number of 0.2 and buoyancy parameters (Bo) of 0.5 and 1.0. The effects of Coriolis forces and centrifugal buoyancy are isolated and studied individually. In all cases it is found that increasing Bo from 0.5 to 1.0 at Ro = 0.2 has little impact on heat transfer. It is found that in the first pass, the heat transfer is quite receptive to Coriolis forces which augment and attenuate heat transfer at the trailing and leading walls, respectively. Centrifugal buoyancy, on the other hand has a bigger effect in augmenting heat transfer at the trailing wall than in attenuating heat transfer at the leading wall. On contrary, it aids heat transfer in the second half of the first pass at the leading wall by energizing the flow near the wall. The heat transfer in the second pass is dominated by the highly turbulent flow exiting the bend. Coriolis forces have no impact on the augmentation of heat transfer on the leading wall till the second half of the passage whereas it attenuates heat transfer at the trailing wall as soon as the flow exits the bend. Contrary to phenomenological arguments, inclusion of centrifugal buoyancy augments heat transfer over Coriolis forces alone on both the leading and trailing walls of the second pass.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaime Rios ◽  
Mehdi Kabirnajafi ◽  
Takele Gameda ◽  
Raid Mohammed ◽  
Jiajun Xu

The present study experimentally and numerically investigates the flow and heat transfer characteristics of a novel nanostructured heat transfer fluid, namely, ethanol/polyalphaolefin nanoemulsion, inside a conventionally manufactured minichannel of circular cross section and a microchannel heat exchanger of rectangular cross section manufactured additively using the Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) process. The experiments were conducted for single-phase flow of pure polyalphaolefin (PAO) and ethanol/PAO nanoemulsion fluids with two ethanol concentrations of 4 wt% and 8 wt% as well as for two-phase flow boiling of nanoemulsion fluids to study the effect of ethanol nanodroplets on the convective flow and heat transfer characteristics. Furthermore, the effects of flow regime of the working fluids on the heat transfer performance for both the minichannel and microchannel heat exchangers were examined within the laminar and transitional flow regimes. It was found that the ethanol/PAO nanoemulsion fluids can improve convective heat transfer compared to that of the pure PAO base fluid under both single- and two-phase flow regimes. While the concentration of nanoemulsion fluids did not reflect a remarkable distinction in single-phase heat transfer performance within the laminar regime, a significant heat transfer enhancement was observed using the nanoemulsion fluids upon entering the transitional flow regime. The heat transfer enhancement at higher concentrations of nanoemulsion within the transitional regime is mainly attributed to the enhanced interaction and interfacial thermal transport between ethanol nanodroplets and PAO base fluid. For two-phase flow boiling, heat transfer coefficients of ethanol/PAO nanoemulsion fluids were further enhanced when the ethanol nanodroplets underwent phase change. A comparative study on the flow and heat transfer characteristics was also implemented between the traditionally fabricated minichannel and additively manufactured microchannel of similar dimensions using the same working fluid of pure PAO and the same operating conditions. The results revealed that although the DMLS fabricated microchannel posed a higher pressure loss, a substantial heat transfer enhancement was achieved as compared to the minichannel heat exchanger tested under the same conditions. The non-post processed surface of the DMLS manufactured microchannel is likely to be the main contributor to the augmented heat transfer performance. Further studies are required to fully appreciate the possible mechanisms behind this phenomenon as well as the convective heat transfer properties of nanoemulsion fluids.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Karthikeyan Paramanandam ◽  
Venkatachalapathy S. ◽  
Balamurugan Srinivasan

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study the flow and heat transfer characteristics of microchannel heatsinks with ribs, cavities and secondary channels. The influence of length and width of the ribs on heat transfer enhancement, secondary flows, flow distribution and temperature distribution are examined at different Reynolds numbers. The effectiveness of each heatsink is evaluated using the performance factor. Design/methodology/approach A three-dimensional solid-fluid conjugate heat transfer numerical model is used to study the flow and heat transfer characteristics in microchannels. One symmetrical channel is adopted for the simulation to reduce the computational cost and time. Flow inside the channels is assumed to be single-phase and laminar. The governing equations are solved using finite volume method. Findings The numerical results are analyzed in terms of average Nusselt number ratio, average base temperature, friction factor ratio, pressure variation inside the channel, temperature distribution, velocity distribution inside the channel, mass flow rate distribution inside the secondary channels and performance factor of each microchannels. Results indicate that impact of rib width is higher in enhancing the heat transfer when compared with its length but with a penalty on the pressure drop. The combined effects of secondary channels, ribs and cavities helps to lower the temperature of the microchannel heat sink and enhances the heat transfer rate. Practical implications The fabrication of microchannels are complex, but recent advancements in the additive manufacturing techniques makes the fabrication of the design considered in this numerical study feasible. Originality/value The proposed microchannel heatsink can be used in practical applications to reduce the thermal resistance, and it augments the heat transfer rate when compared with the baseline design.


2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Md Hamidur Rahman ◽  
Sung In Kim ◽  
Ibrahim Hassan

Steady simulations have been performed to investigate tip leakage flow and heat transfer characteristics on the casing and rotor blade tip in a single stage turbine engine. A turbine stage of stator and rotor was modeled with a pressure ratio of 3.2. The predicted isentropic Mach number and adiabatic wall temperature on the casing showed good agreement with available experimental data. The effects of tip clearance height and rotor rotational speed on the blade tip and casing heat transfer characteristics are mainly considered. It is observed that the tip leakage flow structure is highly dependent on the height of the tip gap as well as speeds of the rotor blade. In all cases, flow separates just around the corner of the pressure side of the blade tip. The region of recirculating flow increases with the increase of the clearance height. Then the flow reattaches on the tip surface near the suction side beyond the flow separation. This flow reattachment enhances surface heat transfer. The leakage flow interaction with the reverse cross flow, induced by relative casing motion, is found to have significant effect on the blade tip and casing heat transfer distribution. Critical region of high heat transfer on the casing exists near the blade tip leading edge and along the pressure side edge at all clearance height. Whereas, at high speed rotation, it tends to move towards the trailing edge due to the change of inflow angle.


2007 ◽  
Vol 130 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan A. Sewall ◽  
Danesh K. Tafti

The problem of accurately predicting the flow and heat transfer in the ribbed internal cooling duct of a rotating gas turbine blade is addressed with the use of large eddy simulations (LES). Four calculations of the developing flow region of a rotating duct with ribs on opposite walls are used to study changes in the buoyancy parameter at a constant rotation rate. The Reynolds number is 20,000, the rotation number is 0.3, and the buoyancy parameter is varied between 0.00, 0.25, 0.45, and 0.65. Previous experimental studies have noted that leading wall heat transfer augmentation decreases as the buoyancy parameter increases with low buoyancy, but heat transfer then increases with high buoyancy. However, no consistent physical explanation has been given in the literature. The LES results from this study show that the initial decrease in augmentation with buoyancy is a result of larger separated regions at the leading wall. However, as the separated region spans the full pitch between ribs with an increase in buoyancy parameter, it leads to increased turbulence and increased entrainment of mainstream fluid, which is redirected toward the leading wall by the presence of a rib. The impinging mainstream fluid results in heat transfer augmentation in the region immediately upstream of a rib. The results obtained from this study are in very good agreement with previous experimental results.


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