ME3122-2 FORCED CONVECTION HEAT TRANSFER

** Students are to bring a thumbdrive to the laboratory session to download experimental

data.

SEMESTER 5

2016/2017

Department of Mechanical Engineering

National University of Singapore

AS A SAFETY MEASURE, WEARING OF SHOES DURING EXPERIMENT IS

MANDATORY. WEARING OF SHORTS OF ANY KIND (E.G. BERMUDAS, MINI
SHORTS) IS ALSO PROHIBITED AND STUDENTS ARE REQUIRED TO WEAR
LONG PANTS.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF TABLES

ii

LIST OF FIGURES

ii

NOMENCLATURE

iii

INTRODUCTION

DESCRIPTION OF THE EQUIPMENT

THEORY

PROCEDURE

ANALYSES

10

REFERENCES

12

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1

Heat Transfer coefficients for different materials

13

Table 2

Properties of air and sphere materials

13

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1

Photograph of the experimental set-up

Figure 2

Photograph showing heating of the spheres for the test

Figure 3

Different types of blower speed controllers

Figure 4

The data acquisition unit

Figure 5

The pdaqview icon on the desktop

Figure 6

The pdaqview software open with digital meters

Figure 7

Pdaqview digital meters reading

Figure 8

Pdaqview with the scan button on

Figure 9

The start of data access

Figure 10

photograph showing the pdaq file

Figure 11

Conversion of pdaq file into excel format

Figure 12

Converted pdaq file in excel format

Figure 13

Heister chart

14
ii

NOMENCLATURE
AS

surface area of the sphere (m2)

Bi

Biot number =

Cp

specific heat capacity (J kg-1 K-1)

acceleration due to gravity (m s-2)

h V / A s
ks

average heat transfer coefficient (W m-2 K-1)

thermal conductivity (W m-1 K-1)

characteristic length = V/A (m)

h
ka

Nu

average Nusselt number =

Pr

Prandtl number,

Qc

convective heat transfer from the surface of the sphere (W)

Re

Reynolds number,

ro

radius of sphere (m)

temperature (oC)

Ti

initial temperature of the sphere (oC)

Ta

ambient temperature (oC)

time (s)

velocity (ms-1)

volume (m3)

thermal diffusivity of the material of the sphere

kinematic viscosity ( m2 s-1)

kinematic viscosity of fluid read against T i in Kelvin from Table 2 ( m2 s-1)

kinematic viscosity of fluid read against T a in Kelvin from Table 2 ( m2 s-1)

density (kg m-3)

C p
ka

2ro U

k
( m2 s-1)
C s

Subscript
a
w
s

air
water
sphere, surface

iii

INTRODUCTION
PURPOSE

The purpose of this manual is to provide guidelines/instructions to enable students to carry

out experiment with an apparatus to determine forced convection heat transfer coefficients.
SCOPE

The manual contains a description of the apparatus and its different components. It also
describes the theory of the experiments and the procedure/methods adopted to analyse and
numerically determine the heat transfer coefficients.
DESCRIPTION OF THE EQUIPMENT

The apparatus consists of a blower driven by a variable speed motor to provide a uniform air
stream through a small wind tunnel. The variable speed blower is capable of achieving a
maximum velocity of about 30 m/s in a 150 mm x 150 mm section. Three spheres made of
brass, aluminium and teflon of 50 mm diameter are provided for the experiments. Before the
commencement of the experiments, these spheres are made available heated to the desired
temperature over a long period in an oven as shown in Fig. 2. This ensures uniform
temperature inside the body of the spheres is attained for the commencement of the
experiments. Provision is made for the insertion of the hot sphere one at a time in the air
stream at the transparent section of the rig. A data acquisition unit in conjunction with a
computer is used to record and store the temperature and flow at a predetermined interval of
30 seconds, as shown in the figure. The thermocouple and pressure transducer are connected
to the data acquisition unit. The temperatures and pressure head can be monitored real time
with the help of the data logger interface software. The use of the software to scan and
monitor the temperature and flow are described in the procedure section of this manual.
Measurement of Temperature

The temperature at the centre of the sphere is measured by a copper constantan thermocouple.
The two terminals of the thermocouple are connected to the data acquisition unit. The data
acquisition unit is configured to scan in the temperature of the sphere at 30 seconds interval.
The scanning of the temperature is stopped when the temperature of the sphere reaches
approximately five degrees more than the room temperature, which can be monitored from
the software.
Measurement of Flow Velocity

The pitot static tube in conjunction with a pressure transducer is used to measure flow
velocity in the wind tunnel in terms of pressure difference. The Pitot tube is connected to the
pressure transducer and the pressure transducer is connected to the data acquisition unit. The
output of the pressure transducer is in dc volts and can be monitored using the software. As
soon as the blower is on, note down the initial pressure reading from the software. As it is
1

seen from the software, the pressure head stabilizes with time. However, there shall be slight
fluctuation in the value of the pressure reading. So take the average of these pressure head
readings for carrying out the post-experiments analysis. Once the pressure head is known, the
flow velocity can be calculated by equating the potential energy due to the pressure head (m)
to an equivalent kinetic energy, a U 2 / 2.

Figure 1 Photograph of the experimental set-up

Figure 2 Photograph showing the heating of the spheres for the experiments

Figure 3 Different types of blower speed controllers

Figure 4 The data acquisition unit

THEORY

The transient heat transfer processes such as cooling of a solid sphere are normally
multidimensional in nature because the temperature within the body is a function of time and
at least one space dimension. However, approximate analysis can be obtained if the Biot
number (h(V/A)/k) is small. Under the condition, the variation of temperature with the spatial
coordinates will be negligibly small, such that the temperature can be taken as a function of
time only. This type of analysis is called the lumped-heat-capacity method.
The cooling of a sold sphere initially at a uniform temperature, T i is considered now. The
solid sphere is cooled by blowing air over it, if we consider the resistance to heat transfer by
conduction within the body is small compared with the convective resistance at the surface,
then an energy balance gives the following equation:
3

q hAs (T Ta ) C p , s V dT
dt

(1)

Equation (1) when integrated, gives the following equation:

T Ta
Ti Ta

exp

hAst
VCs

(2)

Taking natural logarithm on both the sides, the equation (2) can be expressed as:

Ln

3 (
T Ta
Ti Ta
t
r02

hro
k

(3)

The rate of heat dissipation from the surface over a length of time t (s) is given by the
following equation

h AS t
Qc VC p , S (Ti Ta )1 exp

VC p , S

(4)

The maximum amount of heat that can be dissipated from the surface is

Qc max C p,SV Ti Ta
and hence the fractional heat loss is given by the following equation:

1 h 2
Qc
1 exp t
Qmax

Bi k

where

Bi

hV / A 1 hro

k
3 k

(5)

(6)

EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE
4

1.

Before the commencement of the experiments, switch on the computer and ensure the
computer is working properly.

2.

Only brass sphere is used for this experiment.

3.

4.

Locate the icon pDaq View on the desktop of the computer and double click on it.
(Figure 5) to open the data acquisition unit software.

The software is open along with the digital meter as shown in the figure, (Figure 6).

Figure 5 Photograph showing pdaqview icon on the desktop

Figure 6 pdaqview software open with digital meters

5. Click on the Play button of the digital meter and note down the initial manometer reading
(Figure 7)

Figure 7 pDaqView digital meters reading

6

6. Start the motor and set the speed controller knob to the Black marking and wait for two
minutes to stabilize the speed of blower.
7. Click on the scan button to start the scanning in of the data in the data acquisition unit and
ensure the scanning is in progress as shown in the progress part of the window.
(Figure 8)

Figure 8 pDaqView with the scan button on

8. Insert the heated brass sphere in the wind tunnel for cooling.
9. The cooling is carried out until the temperature of the sphere is about 5C higher than the
ambient temperature, as seen from the digital meter. Stop the scanning in of data at this
stage.
10. After the experiment on the current specimen is over, open the Microsoft excel
file. (Figure 9)
11. Go to My Documents then ASCII from excel and locate pDaq under the file type All
files
(Figures 9 and 10) and double click on the file pDaq.

Figure 9 The start of data access

Figure 10 The pDaq file

12. Click the Finish button to complete the conversion of the pDaq file into excel format
(Figure 11 and 12)

Figure 11 Conversion of pdaq file into excel format

Figure 12 Converted pdaq file in excel form

9

13. Save the excel file for calculation and analyses as described in the following section of
the manual.

ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTAL DATA

1.

To carry out the computation, open the saved excel files for the sphere.

The data in the excel sheet are used for the required calculations as outlined below:

Validity of the lumped-heat-capacity method

The Lumped-heat-capacity type of analysis yields reasonable estimates when the

condition given by Eqn (7) is satisfied.
h( V / A )
01
.
k

(7)

Using excel spread sheet, plot the variation of lnT T / Ti T with t / ro using the
measured values from the experiment for brass sphere. Calculate the value of hr / k
which is used as a parameter in the above plot.
2

2. Calculation of convective heat transfer coefficient

To determine the convective heat transfer coefficients, the following four methods are used.
Method 1

Eqn (3) shows that the slope of straight line obtained by drawing the variation of
T T
with t / ro 2 is 3hro / k . Hence, for the sphere, calculate the heat transfer
Ln
Ti T
coefficients by equating the slope to 3hro / k .

10

Method 2

In this method, the mode of heat transfer from the heated sphere is assumed to be through
both convection and radiation. The convection and radiation components are determined as
follows:
(i) Using excel spreadsheet plot a temperature (Y-axis) time (X-axis) graph for the sphere
dT
) from the graph (Gradient can be found using excel
and find out the gradient (
dt
spreadsheet using the display equation feature from the plot)
(ii) The total heat transfers from the sphere to the ambient can be determined as:
Qt CsV

dT
dt

(8)

(iii) The radiation component of the heat transfer (Qr) can be determined using the equation:

Qr As Ts Ta
4

(9)

values of the emissivity, , and Boltzmann constant, , can be taken as 0.8 and 5.67 X 10 -8
W/m2 K4 , respectively. Ts is the average temperature of the sphere in consideration.
(iv) Now we can find out the convective heat transfer component (Qc) by subtracting the
radiation component from the total heat transfer.
Qc Qt Qr

(10)

(v) Using Newtons law of cooling by equation (11), the convective heat transfer coefficient
is determined.

Qc ha As Ts Ta

(11)

Method 3

In this method, the heat transfer coefficient is determined with the help of an empirical
relation (Whitaker) as follows:
Nu 2 (0.4 Re 0.5 0.06Re 2 / 3 )Pr 0.4 (

0.25
)
i

(12)

where 3.5 Re7.6 10 4 ; 0.71Pr380; 1 / i 3.2

The Nusselt number for the sphere is also defined as:

Nu h.2ro / k

(13)

11

Method 4

Determination of convective heat transfer coefficient with the help of Heisler Chart (Fig. 14)
Enter the heat transfer coefficient values obtained from the four methods in Table 1
Observations and Comments
1. Compare the convective heat transfer coefficients of the method 1 with that
obtained from the method 3.
2. Comment on the values of heat transfer coefficients obtained from method 1 and
3.

REFERENCES

1.

Holman, J.P., Heat Transfer, McGraw -Hill, 1972, p.83-88.

2.

Thomas, L.C., Fundamentals of Heat Transfer, Prentice Hall.

12

Table 1 Experimentally determined convective heat transfer coefficients

Spheres

Convective Heat Transfer Coefficient,

W/m2 K

Reynolds Number

Method 1

Method 3

Brass

Table 2: Properties of air and sphere materials

kg m- 3

Cp

k
-1

-1

kJ kg-1K-1 Wm K

10 4

10 5

10 6

m 2 s-1

Kg m-1s-1

m 2 s-1

Pr

Air,300K

1.1774

1.0057

0.02624

0.2216

1.846

15.68

0.708

350K

0.9980

1.0090

0.03003

0.2983

2.075

20.76

0.697

400K

0.8826

1.0140

0.03365

0.3760

2.286

25.90

0.689

450K

0.7833

1.0207

0.03707

0.4222

2.484

28.86

0.683

Aluminum

2707

0.896

206

0.8418

Mild steel

7833

0.465

52

0.1474

Brass

8522

0.385

128

0.3412

Teflon

2200

1.046

0.35

0.00152

13

Figure 13: Heisler Chart

14