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Numerical simulation of heat transfer in metal foams

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Abstract

This paper reports a numerical study of forced convection heat transfer in high porosity aluminum foams. Numerical modeling is done considering both local thermal equilibrium and non local thermal equilibrium conditions in ANSYS-Fluent. The results of the numerical model were validated with experimental results, where air was forced through aluminum foams in a vertical duct at different heat fluxes and velocities. It is observed that while the LTE model highly under predicts the heat transfer in these foams, LTNE model predicts the Nusselt number accurately. The novelty of this study is that once hydrodynamic experiments are conducted the permeability and porosity values obtained experimentally can be used to numerically simulate heat transfer in metal foams. The simulation of heat transfer in foams is further extended to find the effect of foam thickness on heat transfer in metal foams. The numerical results indicate that though larger foam thicknesses resulted in higher heat transfer coefficient, this effect weakens with thickness and is negligible in thick foams.

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Abbreviations

A :

Surface area of the aluminum plate, m2

a,b :

Coefficients of fit in Eq. 15

C :

Form drag coefficient, m−1

C p :

Specific heat at constant pressure, J/kg K

h :

Heat transfer coefficient, W/m2 K

K :

Permeability of foam assembly, m2

k e f f :

Effective thermal conductivity of porous medium defined in Eq. 14, W/m K

k f :

Thermal conductivity of air, W/m K

k s :

Thermal conductivity of solid foam material, W/m K

L :

Length of aluminum foam assembly along flow direction, m

N u H :

Nusselt number based on foam thickness, h H/k f

PPI:

Number of pores per inch of metal foam

ΔP :

Pressure drop across test section, Pa

Q:

Heat input, W

Q l o s s :

Heat loss through the insulation, W

R e H :

Reynolds number based on foam thickness, U H/ν

T :

Surface temperature of aluminum plate, ∘C

ΔT :

Excess temperature of air over ambient defined in Eq. 18, ∘C

u :

Inlet velocity of air in the flow direction, m/s

V :

Velocity vector, m/s

E :

Total energy of the medium

S :

Enthalpy source term

μ :

Dynamic viscosity of air, kg/m-s

ν :

Kinematic viscosity of air, m2/s

ρ :

Density of air, kg/m3

ϕ :

Volumetric porosity of the metal foam

eff:

Effective

f:

Air

loss:

Heat loss through the insulation

s:

Solid

\(\infty \) :

Ambient conditions

sf:

Solid-fluid interface

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Heat Transfer and Thermal Power Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, 600036, India

    Priyatham Gangapatnam, Renju Kurian & S. P. Venkateshan

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  1. Priyatham Gangapatnam
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  2. Renju Kurian
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  3. S. P. Venkateshan
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Correspondence to Renju Kurian.

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Gangapatnam, P., Kurian, R. & Venkateshan, S.P. Numerical simulation of heat transfer in metal foams. Heat Mass Transfer 54, 553–562 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00231-017-2149-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00231-017-2149-6

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