A Numerical Study of Turbulent Natural Convection in a Rectangular Enclosure with Localised Heating and Cooling

This study models natural turbulent convection in a rectangular enclosure with localized heating and cooling. The equations used in modeling the flow are the equation of continuity, momentum equation and the energy equation. The model that is considered is a rectangular enclosure with one side wall being heated and the other side wall being cooled. The other walls of the enclosure are adiabatic. The non ? linear differential equations obtained by using the k - turbulence model are solved using the finite difference technique and a computer program called FLUENT 6.3.26 is used in the presentation of results in form of contours. The results of the study show that with increase in the Rayleigh Number, there is increase in the number of contours and vortices. With regard to the velocity magnitude, it is found that an increase in the Rayleigh number results in increase in the turbulence hence implying that there is an increase in the velocity magnitude.