CFD Analysis of Fluid Flowing Through a Heat Exchanger Tube Having a Twisted Tape with a Centrally Placed Semi-Circular Groove

Heat exchangers are very much essential industrial as well as domestic equipment used every day. Overall performance of any machines and many systems as a whole depend on the performance of a heat exchanger. Number of researches have been done to develop devices or means to enhance the performance of a heat exchanger. The most successful development of a component for the most efficient enhancement of heat exchanger performance is development of twisted tape inserts for heat exchanger tubes. It increases flow path of the fluid inside the tube so that more and more and more heat can be transferred from the tube. At the same time due to this twisted tape insert turbulence of the flow inside the tube can be increased. This increase in turbulence will in other way decrease the overall efficiency of the heat exchanger. So optimum design of tube insert is very essential for having maximum efficiency. In the present work few design modifications have been adopted over a previously designed tube insert and their thermal performance have been analysed using a CFD software named ANSYS Fluent.