Numerical simulation of corrugated inclination angle on the performance of plate heat exchanger

Abstract

Plate heat exchanger is a kind of compact heat exchanger, which has high heat transfer coefficient and compact structure and is easy to wash. In recent years it has been widely used, but also has the disadvantages of big flow resistance. In this paper the numerical simulation is performed by using the CFD soft FLUENT[1]. A 3D geometric model is established and whose mesh is generated. The fields of the temperature, pressure and velocity in the computational domain are simulated. And the effect of the corrugation inclination angle on the heat transfer and flow is analyzed. From the numerical simulation, we can get some conclusions about the corrugation inclination angle. Along with the corrugation inclination angle increases, heat exchange gets better and plate pressure drop decreases. Corrugated plate with inclination angle(70°) is good for the cleaning effect of the high-speed turbulence which can effectively reduce the deposited dirt. If we consider the heat transfer and the resistance, inclination angle should be from 60°to 70°. By this conclusions, we can get a best inclination angle to design the plate heat exchanger.