The natural convection inside a 3D triangular cross section cavity filled with nanofluid and included cylinder with different arrangements

Abstract

In this paper the laminar unsteady natural convection heat transfer of (Al2O3-water) nanofluid inside 3D triangular cross section cavity was investigated. The cavity was heated differentially, the vertical walls were kept at different constant temperatures. The left hot and the right cold. The effect of the solid volume fraction was examined for two values and compared with the pure water results. The (Ra) range studied was (103 ≤ Ra ≤ 106). Inserting cylindrical body inside the cavity also investigated in three cases. One concentric cylinder has radius (15%) of the cavity side length. The other cases were of two cylinders having radius (7.5%) of the cavity side length, aligned vertically or nonaligned. The results show that the higher solid volume fraction gives the maximum enhancement of the average (Nu) and this enhancement increases with (Ra) increase. For the cases with inner cylinders, the average (Nu) enhanced for the case of double cylinders over single cylinder. On other hand, the nonaligned position of the cylinders giving more enhancement than other position. As like as, the location of maximum horizontal or vertical velocities were varied with the cylinders position while (Ra) has no effect.