Numerical Investigation on Heat Transfer Enhancement in Serpentine Mini-Channel Heat Sink

Abstract

In this study, laminar convection flow in a serpentine mini-channel heat sink (MCHS) is numerically investigated. The finite volume approach is employed to obtain the numerical solution by solving the two-dimensional governing equations of continuity, momentum and energy. This study analyses the influence of curvature diameters (CD=10, 20, and 30 mm) and Reynolds number (Re ranging from 100 to 800) on various parameters, including the friction factor, the average Nusselt number (Nu), thermal and viscous entropy generation as well as performance evaluation criteria factor. It is found that the frictional and thermal entropy generation as well as overall Nu increase with Re, while decreasing with larger curvature diameters. When Re is greater than 300, the friction factor increases as the curvature diameters decrease. Furthermore, the serpentine MCHS with a curvature diameter of 10 mm and Re of 1000 displays the maximum heat transfer enhancement is around 12.5% as a compared to the other cases. Moreover, the highest performance factor is about 1.05 at a curvature diameter of 30 mm and Re of 100. Therefore, serpentine minichannel can be proposed to design heat sink with a higher performance and more compact size.