Thermo-Hydraulic Performance of Tubular Heat Exchanger with Opposite-Oriented Trapezoidal Wing Perforated Baffle Plate

A detailed experimental study explored a new axial heat exchanger with swirling air over heated tubes. This heat exchanger features circular baffle plates with perforations and trapezoidal air deflectors at different angles. The tubes are aligned parallel to the airflow, and the deflectors create intense air turbulence, which improves heat transfer. The heat flux on the tubes is kept constant, and each baffle plate has eight deflectors positioned in reverse to induce swirling air within a circular duct that contains the hot water tubes. The baffle plates are spaced with varying pitch ratios, and the Reynolds number ranges from 16,000 to 30,000. The study found that the heat exchanger's performance highly depends on the pitch ratio and deflector angle, with the highest thermal enhancement factor (TEF) of 2.48 achieved at a 30° deflector angle and a pitch ratio of 1.2. These findings highlight the importance of optimizing design parameters to improve heat exchanger performance, offering valuable insights for better thermal management in industrial and environmental applications.