CFD Investigations of Thermal and Dynamic Behaviors in a Tubular Heat Exchanger With Butterfly Baffles

Abstract

In the present paper, the effects of a new baffle design on the efficiency of a tubular heat exchanger are numerically investigated. It concerns butterfly baffles inserted in a cylindrical tube heat exchanger. We focus on the influence of the shape of baffles, the space between baffles (pitch ratio, PR) and the baffle size (i.e. the blockage ratio, BR) on the heat transfer and flow characteristics. Three geometrical configurations with different PRs are realized (PR = 1, 2 and 4) and five others with different blockage ratios (BR = 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5). The investigations are achieved for Reynolds numbers ranging from 3000 to 8000. All analyses are realized with the help of the CFD Fluent software. The numerical results are compared with available experimental data and a satisfactory agreement is found. The obtained results showed that the butterfly baffle with PR = 4 and BR = 0.1 is the best design that ensures the best flow mixing and increases the thermal enhancement factor by about 1.7 time with a moderate pressure drop.

Thermal hydraulic performance of a tubular heat exchanger with in‐line perforated baffle with shutter type saw tooth turbulator

“…The tubes contain the hot vapor while the cooling fluid flows across the shell side. Swirling flow can be achieved by introducing twisted tape inserts, V‐winglets, 19 winglet tapes, 20 helical baffles, flower baffles, 21 butterfly baffles, 22 and V‐baffles 23 within the tubes or shells to enhance heat transfer. These components encourage swirling motions in the flow, improving HT rates.…”

The effect of triangular shutter type flow deflector perforated baffle plate on the thermofluid performance of a heat exchanger

“…Karima et al 29 numerically investigated the effect of BR and PR on the TEF of a tubular HX with butterfly baffles. Three PR and five BR were tested with Re 3000–8000.…”

Vapour Absorption Process in an Nh3/Lino3 Bubble Absorber Using an Optimized CFD Model

“…The use of CFD facilitates assessing and optimizing the performance of thermal processes and equipment at a lower cost and difficulty, provided a reliable validation of the model. Therefore, the identification of adequate simulation conditions and multiphase models to simulate different flow patterns and complex heat and mass transfer processes is of interest in sustainable energy conversion systems (Karima et al, 2018;Anand et al, 2020;Mirzaie et al, 2020;Soheel et al, 2021;Bhagat and Deshmukh, 2022).…”