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Aqueous Al2O3 nanofluids: the important factors impacting convective heat transfer

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Abstract

A high accuracy, counter flow double pipe heat exchanger system is designed for the measurement of convective heat transfer coefficients with different nanofluids. Both positive and negative enhancement of convective heat transfer of alumina nanofluids are found in the experiments. A modified equation was proposed to explain above phenomena through the physic properties of nanofluids such as thermal conductivity, special heat capacity and viscosity.

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Abbreviations

a :

Thermal diffusivity (m2/s)

A :

Heat exchanging area (m2)

C peff :

Effective heat capacity (J/K)

\(C_{{pH_{2} O}}\) :

Heat capacity of water (J/K)

\(C_{{pAl_{2} O_{3} }}\) :

Heat capacity of Al2O3 particle (J/K)

D :

Tube inner diameter (m)

d f :

Fractal dimension of the aggregates (m)

dTln :

Log mean temperature difference (K)

dt i :

Inlet temperature difference (K)

dt o :

Outlet temperature difference (K)

f :

Friction factor

h :

Convective heat transfer coefficient (W/K m2)

k e :

Effective thermal conductivity (W/K m)

k m :

Thermal conductivity of the base liquid (W/K m)

k p :

Solids phase thermal conductivity (W/K m)

k a :

Aggregate thermal conductivity (W/K m)

Nu :

Nusselt number

Pr :

Prandtl number

Q :

Heat flux (W/m2)

Re :

Reynolds number

r p :

Particle radius (m)

r a :

Aggregate gyration radius (m)

T :

Temperature (K)

t pi :

Inlet primary fluid temperature (K)

t si :

Inlet secondary fluid temperature (K)

t po :

Outlet primary fluid temperature (K)

t so :

Outlet secondary fluid temperature (K)

V :

Flow rate (l/min)

v :

Velocity of fluid (m/s)

v p :

Volume fraction of the particle

w :

Weight fraction of the particle

p :

Nanofluid density (kg/m3)

ρ f :

Base fluid density (kg/m3)

μ :

Nanofluids viscosity (Pa s)

μ f :

Base fluid viscosity (Pa s)

μ w :

Viscosity at tube wall temperature (Pa s)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dispersia Ltd, 103 Clarendon Road, Leeds, LS2 9DF, UK

    Jianguo Cao & Yulong Ding

  2. Institute of Particle Science and Engineering, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT, UK

    Caiyun Ma

Authors
  1. Jianguo Cao
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  2. Yulong Ding
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  3. Caiyun Ma
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Correspondence to Jianguo Cao.

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Cao, J., Ding, Y. & Ma, C. Aqueous Al2O3 nanofluids: the important factors impacting convective heat transfer. Heat Mass Transfer 50, 1639–1648 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00231-014-1374-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00231-014-1374-5

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