Abstract Pool boiling process is frequently encountered in a number of engineering applications. It is difficult to exactly predict the heat transfer coefficient. This is because the boiling phenomenon is rather complex and influenced by many factors, such as surface condition, heater size, geometry, material, arrangement of heated rods, and refrigerants, etc. The key boiling parameters (bubble dynamics data) such as bubble departure diameter, frequency, velocity and nucleation site density will be varied in such different heated rod pitches resulting in the different effect of heat transfer. Furthermore, more fundamental of the physical phenomenon can be obtained. Pool boiling heat transfer of R-134a is investigated experimentally on twin tube arrangement. The tube pitch is 1.65 and 2.5. The surface condition was prepared with plasma spray coating. In addition, using the high-speed digital camera and LDV, the bubble diameter and dynamics of R-134a were measured while growing. The boiling curves in different twin-tube pitches were drawn and the influence of bubble velocity on heat transfer coefficients was also examined. Finally, to broaden our basic understanding of different arrangement of heated rods and heat transfer mechanisms, thermal design data of a flooded type evaporator of high performance as well as more and further physical insight of the above-stated nucleate boiling heat transfer can be acquired. The results would hopefully be helpful not only for the academia but also for the industry.