A Parametric Study on Mixed Convection in a Vertical Channel in the Presence of Wire Mesh

Abstract

A numerical study on mixed convection is carried out through a partially filled brass wire mesh in a vertical channel. A heater embedded with aluminum plates is placed at the center of the vertical channel. The aluminum heater assembly is wrapped with brass wire mesh to facilitate more heat transfer. The vertical channel that consists of aluminum heater assembly with the brass wire mesh is considered as the numerical model. Local thermal non-equilibrium and Darcy extended Forchheimer models are used to accomplish the numerical simulations for thermal and flow characteristics of the considered domain. The aim of the study is to find out the optimum filling of the brass wire mesh in the channel which gives a higher heat transfer rate with low pumping power of the fluid. In the present analysis, three different filling conditions of wire mesh are considered: (i) fully filled channel, (ii) 70% filled channel, and (iii) 40% filled channel. From the results, it is inferred that the vertical channel partially filled with 70% of wire mesh porous medium predicts 89% of heat transfer of the completely filled channel with 41% reduced pressure loss. As a result, the proposed parametric study is good enough to prove that the partly filled wire mesh can be used in the thermal applications where augmentation of heat transfer is required with less pressure drop.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Banjara Kotresha

Banjara Kotresha is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Government Engineering College, Haveri, Karnataka, India. He graduated in Mechanical Engineering from University B. D. T., College of Engineering, Davangere, Karnataka in 2002 and obtained his Master’s degree from the same University in Thermal Engineering Systems Technology in 2006 and Ph.D. from National Institute of Technology Karnataka, Surathkal (2019) under the supervision of Dr. N. Gnanasekaran. His research interests include numerical simulations, fluid flow and heat transfer through porous media, experimental and numerical heat transfer.

Nagarajan Gnanasekaran

Nagarajan Gnanasekaran is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the National Institute of Technology Karnataka, India. He graduated in Mechanical Engineering (2002) from Bharathidasan University and obtained his Master of Engineering in Thermal Engineering (2006) from Government College of Technology and Ph.D. from Indian Institute of Technology Madras (2012), Chennai under the supervision of Prof. C. Balaji, IIT Madras. He pursued Postdoctoral fellowship under the supervision of Prof. Helcio R. B. Orlande, in the field of inverse bio-heat transfer at Federal University, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2017). His research interests include computational inverse problems, stochastic modeling techniques, experimental and numerical heat transfer, and hybrid optimization.