CFD-based thermal-hydraulic analysis of double-pipe heat exchangers equipped with structured metal-foam inserts

Increasing heat transfer in double-pipe heat exchangers (DPHEs) is an interesting topic due to challenges that still remain to be solved, especially when working under low-to-moderate flow rate regimes where poor mixing and thermal boundary layers reduce the effectiveness of convection. Despite numerous studies conducted on the basis of metal-foam and insert-type enhancement methods, existing research mostly covers completely-filled or simplified partially-filled cases. The present work numerically investigates thermo-hydraulic performance of a countercurrent DPHE using various structured metal-foam inserts installed in the annulus region. In particular, a three-dimensional CFD model of the studied geometry was successfully validated with previously reported experimental data with deviations not exceeding ±5 % for the average Nusselt number and ±7 % for the friction factor. In simulations, hot water flows inside the inner pipe at temperature 75 °C and 3 L/min, whereas cold water enters the annulus at temperature 30 °C with flow rates of 1 to 9 L/min, equivalent to Reynolds numbers of 205-1845. In total, nine geometries were considered including a smooth basecase, fully filled foam geometry, circular ring foam baffles, continuous three-strips foam geometry, as well as five interrupted three-strips foams with 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13 interruptions, respectively. For all cases, copper foam with porosity 0.9 and pores density 40 PPI was used, while water thermophysical properties were assumed constant. It was found that inserting structured metal-foam increases heat transfer due to mixing effect and repeated disruption/regeneration of thermal boundary layer. As compared with the smooth base case, the fully filled metal-foam geometry showed the largest improvement in heat transfer performance by providing up to 15 times higher values of the average Nusselt number. Nevertheless, the interrupted strips foam designs demonstrated the best thermo-hydraulic characteristics in terms of trade-off between enhanced heat transfer and increased pressure drop penalty. In particular, the interrupted foams led to approximately 1.5-3 times higher friction factor than the smooth geometry, while performance evaluation factor PEF equaled approximately 2.8. Therefore, it can be concluded that interrupting structured metal-foam inserts could be considered promising passive enhancement approach for low-to-moderate Reynolds number DPHEs.