Experimental investigation of heat-transfer characteristics of aluminum-foam heat sinks

Hsieh, Wen‐Hsin; Wu, Jing-Yuan; Shih, Wei-Hung; Chiu, Wei-Chi

doi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2004.04.037

Cited by 166 publications

(56 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…11. Metal foam heat sink setup as used by Hsieh et al [69] and Shih et al [72]. He conducts research on convective heat transfer enhancement and condensate retention management in compact heat exchangers.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Review of Metal Foam and Metal Matrix Composites for Heat Exchangers and Heat Sinks

Han

Wang

Park³

et al. 2012

Heat Transfer Engineering

225

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Abstract:Recent advances in manufacturing methods open the possibility for broader use of metal foams and metal matrix composites (MMCs) for heat exchangers, and these materials can have tailored material properties. Metal foams in particular combine a number of interesting properties from a heat exchanger's point of view. In this paper, the material properties of metal foams and MMCs are surveyed, and the current state of the art is reviewed for heat exchanger applications. Four different applications are considered: liquid-liquid, liquid-gas and gas-gas heat exchangers and heat sinks. Manufacturing and implementation issues are identified and discussed, and it is concluded that these materials hold promise both for heat exchangers and heat sinks, but that some key issues still need to be solved before broad scale

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Hsieh et al [69] experimentally determined heat transfer correlations for six types of Al foam heat sinks (pore density: 10 -40 ppi, porosity: 0.87 -0.96) and found that increasing the porosity and pore density results in a higher Nusselt number. The studied configuration is shown in Fig.…”

Section: Heat Sinksmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Review of Metal Foam and Metal Matrix Composites for Heat Exchangers and Heat Sinks

Han

Wang

Park³

et al. 2012

Heat Transfer Engineering

225

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“…The volume goodness results indicated that porous fins with low permeability and low porosity are preferable with regards to the compactness of porous fin heat exchangers. Hsieh et al [22] experimentally determined heat transfer correlations for 6 types of aluminum foam heat sinks (pore density:…”

Section: Metal Foam Heat Exchangersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thermo-hydraulic study of a single row heat exchanger consisting of metal foam covered round tubes

T’Joen

Jaeger

Huisseune

et al. 2010

International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

115

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Open cell metal foam is a novel engineering material that offers an interesting combination of materials properties from a heat exchanger point of view such as a high specific surface area, tortuous flow paths for flow mixing and low weight. A new heat exchanger design with metal foams is studied in this work, aimed at low airside pressure drop. It consists of a single row of aluminum tubes covered with thin layers (4-8 mm) of metal foam. Through wind tunnel testing the impact of various parameters on the thermo-hydraulic performance was considered, including the Reynolds number, the tube spacing, the foam height and the type of foam. The results indicated that providing a good metallic bonding between the foam and the tubes can be achieved, metal foam covered tubes with a small tube spacing, small foam heights and made of foam with a high specific surface area potentially offer strong benefits at higher air velocities (> 4 m/s) compared to helically finned tubes. The bonding was done by conductive epoxy glue and was found to have a strong impact on the final results, showing a strong need for a cost-effective and efficient brazing process to connect metal foams to the tube surfaces.

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“…Three niche technological areas that fit within this broad application are; thermal processes demanding high rate of simultaneous chemical reactions [51,52], fast rate heat removal from high power electronic components, and highly efficient heat rejection in power cycles [53] operating at low temperature differentials. A large number of studies on metal foam heat exchangers in the past decade have been centered around high performance heat exchangers of some forms [17,41,49,54,55]. Some of these studies concern fundamental investigations of the materials themselves, other are dealing with practical applications with relatively small metal foam volume.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some of these studies concern fundamental investigations of the materials themselves, other are dealing with practical applications with relatively small metal foam volume. Notable examples of the latter cases are compact heat sinks for high density and high power electronic components [18,39,41,54,56]. Prior research of interest to this present study are those involving heat exchangers of tubular design, some of which have been reviewed in Section 2.3.2(b) of Chapter 2.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving the performance of air-cooled condensers by using metal foams

Chumpia¹

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This research investigates the implementation of porous metals particularly aluminum foam as an enhanced surface to improve heat transfer on the air side of air-cooled, tubular heat exchangers. The target application for these heat exchangers is the condensers for geothermal power plants in remote locations of Australia where water for wet cooling is scarce. Traditional practices for liquid-to-air or vapor-to-air heat exchangers rely predominantly on finned surfaces to enhance heat transfer rate. Heat transfer enhancement in these designs is achieved via an increased surface area of simple geometries. Recent advancement in manufacturing and availability of porous materials make them possible to be utilized in thermal exchange equipment to improve efficiency and compactness.This work describes heat exchanger tubes based on circular cylinders with aluminum foam covering on the outer surface. Thermo-hydraulic performances are evaluated experimentally in a cross-flow using low-speed wind tunnel. The tests are performed on single cylinders, single row arrays, and multi-row tube bundles in both aligned and staggered configurations subjected to airflow of 0.5 to 5.0 m/s. This range of air velocities is chosen as it encompasses vertical flow regimes occur inside typical cooling towers. The effects of foam layer thickness, transversal and longitudinal tube pitches, foam-to-tube bonding methods, and tube bank patterns, are collectively investigated. The results are compared to baseline data obtained from conventional, annular finned tubes and tube bundles tested under the same conditions.The overall conclusions are drawn on heat transfer and pressure drop as two main comparison parameters. Experimental results on these parameters confirm the trend of numerical findings of a previous in-house study, although with varying degrees of differences on their magnitude. In all finned-versus foam-surface comparisons, under the same testing conditions and using specimens of similar dimensions, the latter shows convincing benefits on heat transfer/pressure drop ratios over the full range of chosen airflows. Within this range, the maximum relative advantage of the foam-covered heat exchangers over the finned type is observed at the midrange of airflow between 2.0 and 2.5 m/s. This result is both desirable and opportune because these designated airflows coincide with the top end velocity found inside most natural-draft cooling towers. Beyond this range of airflow up to 5.0 m/s, a typical range at the lower end of induced-or forced-draft cooling towers, the relative merit of heat transfer/pressure drop is rapidly degraded. However, in a situation where the increased heat transfer is under demand and compactness is not a critical factor, the pressure drop can be reduced satisfactorily by choosing a suitable transversal pitch within the tube bundle. Under this reduced blockage condition, metal foam heat exchanger bundles tend to behave as a group of an individual tube; therefore, retain higher relative benefit in terms of the sum...

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Experimental investigation of heat-transfer characteristics of aluminum-foam heat sinks

Cited by 166 publications

References 14 publications

A Review of Metal Foam and Metal Matrix Composites for Heat Exchangers and Heat Sinks

A Review of Metal Foam and Metal Matrix Composites for Heat Exchangers and Heat Sinks

Thermo-hydraulic study of a single row heat exchanger consisting of metal foam covered round tubes

Improving the performance of air-cooled condensers by using metal foams

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