A numerical study of the effects of heat transfer and fluid flow on tube insertion length in computer-cooling radiators

Abstract

The performance of flat-tube radiators with lowered fins was numerically investigated for different tube insertion lengths. The results of numerical analysis using CFX-11 were compared with experimental results. In this study, three types of flat-tube radiators with lowered fins were considered An experiment was conducted to validate the numerical results. Flow rate ratio (FR) and Stotai were introduced to understand the uniformity of flow distribution easily. The results of numerical analysis revealed that the heat transfer rate and pressure drop increased as the mass flow rate increased Further, the results showed that the heat transfer rate of sample 3 with h/D = 0.5 was higher than that of the other samples. The pressure drop increased as the insertion length toward the header part increased and the pressure drop in the case of sample 3 appeared to be the highest The factor Stotal showed that the uniformity of the flow distribution in the case of sample 1 with h/D = 0 was higher than that in the case of the other samples. © 2011 The Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers.