Heat transfer under transition and film boiling of liquids at dimpled spheres and cylinders

Abstract

The article presents the results of studies of heat transfer and film and transition boiling mechanism of nitrogen, Refrigerant R-113, and water at spheres and vertical cylinders, which surfaces are covered with spherical dimples.. The data were obtained under the conditions of pool boiling and natural circulation in vertical 1.0 and 2.5 mm wide annular channels. Hemispherical dimples of 3 mm diameter (h/d = 0.17) were made on sample surfaces. The dimples occupied 45% of the sphere surface and 37% of the cylinder surface. In some tests, the dimpled surface was additionally covered with low-conductive coating (10 μm film). Minimal cooling time for the sphere with dimples and low-conductive coating took place under natural circulation in 2.5 mm annular gap and it was almost 2.5 times lower than that for a smooth sphere under pool boiling. It is shown that at pool boiling the presence of dimples and low-conductive coating leads to heat transfer enhancement at transition and film boiling regimes, while at natural circulation such an enhancement occurs at film boiling with high temperature differences. The tests at natural circulation in vertical annular channels of different width showed that in this case an intensity of boiling heat transfer is higher than that at pool boiling. High-speed filming of film boiling process on the surfaces with dimples was conducted.