Heat-transfer enhancement of nanofluids in a car radiator

Abstract

In recent times, enhancing the efficiency of automobiles has become very important. As part of this effort, increasing the efficiency of the heat transfer in the radiator of an automobile is also crucial. The present approach involves an addition of nanoparticles to the cooling liquid. Most of the current results were obtained using a few types of nanoparticles. Only a limited amount of work involved hybrid nanofluids including several types of nanoparticles. Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) were used along with aluminium-oxide nanoparticles to form a nanofluid with the base fluid (ethylene glycol (EG) + distilled water (DW)-1:1 ratio) having volume concentrations of (0.03, 0.06, 0.09 and 0.12) %. The characterization of the nanoparticles was carried out. The experiments were carried out at inlet temperatures of 40-75°C, with increments of 5°C. The volume flow rate was varied from 0.6 m 3 /h to 0.96 m 3 /h, with increments of 0.12 m 3 /h. An increase in the heat transfer of 35 % was achieved.