A thermal analysis of a conventional vaporization source by finite difference methods, including experimental validation, is presented. Such a system is common to industries whose chief concern is the precipitation of inorganic coatings. Both the physical and the model systems are comprised of a number of layers, or strata, arranged in a rectangular configuration. The model strata represent the component and deposition materials of the physical vaporization source. The symmetry and simplistic geometry of the operational source permit the use of a two-dimensional model, thereby neglecting gradients in the third dimension. The production unit, as well as the numerical model, experience various modes of heat transfer, including radiation, convection, conduction, internal generation, and phase change. Moreover, the system inputs are time-dependent. The numerical model is subsequently compared to and validated against both simplistic case studies and the physical production system. Data collected from the operational deposition source is examined and analyzed in comparison to corresponding information generated by the numerical model. Sufficient agreement between the data sets encourages the utilization of the numerical model as a practical indicator of the subject system's behavior. Finally, recommendations for modifications to the physical vaporization source, yielding practical improvements in temperature uniformity, are evaluated based on the predictions of the validated numerical model. The goal is the attainment of an ideally uniform temperature distribution that would correspond to highly desirable performance of the process vaporization system. / Master of Science

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Master of Science / Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering / Steven J. Eckels, Bruce R. Babin / This project studied the pool boiling of R-134a and R-123 on smooth and enhanced tubes. This is the 1st phase of ASHRAE project RP-1316 "Experimental Evaluation of The Heat Transfer Impacts of Tube Pitch in a Highly Enhanced Surface Tube Bundle". A Turbo BII-HP and a Turbo BII-LP enhanced tubes were used in this study. These tubes were manufactured and donated by Wolverine Tube, Inc. Four different boiling cases were tested, R-134a on smooth tube, R-123 on smooth tube, R-134a on Turbo BII-HP tube, and R-123 on Turbo BII-LP tube. The first step in this study was performing a modified Wilson plot analysis, once completed, the average and local refrigerant heat transfer coefficients were determined. This thesis also presents the enthalpy-based heat transfer analysis (EBHT), a new method for determining the heat exchanger's overall heat transfer coefficient as a function of the enthalpy change of incompressible fluids. The test tubes' outer diameter is 19.05 mm and length is 1 m. Tests were conducted in a single tube test section, in which the test tube was water heated. All tests were conducted at a saturation temperature of 4.44 °C. The heat flux range is 9.2-126.6 kW/m[superscript]2 for testing with R-134a on smooth tube, 9.2-58 kW/m[superscript]2 for R-123 on smooth tube, 4.1-135.1 kW/m[superscript]2 for R-134a on Turbo BII-HP tube and 4.7-59.8 kW/m[superscript]2 for R-123 on Turbo BII-LP tube. Results show that the heat transfer coefficient increases with heat flux for all cases except the case of R-134a on Turbo BII-HP tube, where it experiences a trend change. Part of this study was comparing the smooth and enhanced tubes performances. R-134a Turbo BII-HP tube to smooth tube heat transfer coefficient ratio changes from 4 at low heat flux to 1.7 at high heat flux. R-123 Turbo BII-LP tube to smooth tube heat transfer coefficient ratio changes from 24 at low heat flux to 7 at high heat flux. The performance of Turbo BII-HP and Turbo BII-LP was found to be very similar over the tested heat flux range of the Turbo BII-LP tube. Comparison plots with available literature are presented.

A heat exchanger is a device used to transfer thermal energy between two or more fluids, at different temperatures in thermal contact. They are widely used in aerospace, chemical industries, power plants, refineries, HVAC refrigeration, and in many industries. The optimal design and efficient operation of the heat exchanger and heat transfer network plays an important role in industry in improving efficiencies and to reduce production cost and energy consumption. In this paper, significance of shape of inner pipe of double pipe heat exchanger was analyzed with respect to triangular, hexagonal and octagonal shaped inner pipes. The performance of double pipe heat exchangers was investigated with and without dent pattern using CFD analysis in ANSYS and efficient heat transfer results are identified from CFD outputs. On basis of literature review, few factors influencing the efficiency of heat exchanger and method to improve the efficiency are discussed.

The thermal efficiency of gas turbines increases with the temperature of the gas entering its turbine component. To enable high inlet temperatures, even those that far exceed the melting point of the turbine materials, the turbine must be cooled. One way is by internal cooling, where cooler air passes through U-ducts embedded inside turbine vanes and blades. Since the flow and heat transfer in these ducts are highly complicated, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) based on RANS have been used extensively to explore and assess design concepts. However, RANS have been found to be unreliable – giving accurate results for some designs but not for others. In this study, large-eddy simulations (LES) were performed for a U-duct with a trapezoidal cross section to assess four widely used RANS turbulence models: realizable k-ε (k-ε), shear-stress transport (SST), Reynolds stress model with linear pressure strain (RSM-LPS), and the seven-equation stress-omega full Reynolds stress model (RSM).<div><br></div><div>When examining the capability of steady RANS, two versions of the U-duct were examined, one with a staggered array of pin fins and one without pin fins. Results obtained for the heat-transfer coefficient (HTC) were compared with experimental measurements. The maximum relative error in the predicted “averaged” HTC was found to be 50% for k-ε and RSM-LPS, 20% for SST, and 30% for RSM-τω when there are no pin fins and 25% for k-ε, 12% for the SST and RSM-τω when there are pin fins. When there are no pin fins, all RANS models predicted a large separated flow region downstream of the turn, which the experiment does show to exist. Thus, all models predicted local distributions poorly. When there were pin fins, they behaved like guide vanes in turning the flow and confined the separation around the turn. For this configuration, all RANS models predicted reasonably well.<br></div><div><br></div><div>To understand why RANS cannot predict the HTC in the U-duct after the turn when there are no pin fins, LES were performed. To ensure that the LES is benchmark quality, verification and validation were performed via LES of a straight duct with square cross section where data from experiments and direct numerical simulation (DNS) are available. To ensure correct inflow boundary condition is provided for the U-duct, a concurrent LES is performed of a straight duct with the same trapezoidal cross section and flow conditions as the U-duct. Results obtained for the U-duct show RANS models to be inadequate in predicting the separation due to their inability to predict the unsteady separation about the tip of the turn. To investigate the limitations of the RANS models, LES results were generated for the turbulent kinetic energy, Reynolds-stresses, pressure-strain rate, turbulent diffusion, pressure diffusion, turbulent transport, and velocity-temperature correlations with focus on understanding their behavior induced by the turn region of the U-duct. As expected, the Boussinesq assumption was found to be incorrect, which led to incorrect predictions of Reynolds stresses. For RSM-τω, the modeling of the pressure-strain rate was found to match LES data well, but huge error was found on modeling the turbulent diffusion. This huge error indicates that the two terms in the turbulent diffusion – pressure diffusion and turbulent transport – should be modeled separately. Since the turbulent transport was found to be ignorable, the focus should be on modeling the pressure diffusion. On the velocity-temperature correlations, the existing eddy-diffusivity model was found to be over simplified if there is unsteady separation with shedding. The generated LES data could be used to provide the guidance for a better model.<br></div>

Structural fire design represents one important aspect of the design of reinforced concrete buildings. The work presented in this thesis seeks to elucidate the structural behaviour of reinforced concrete slabs during exposure to heating from below, as would occur in the case of a building fire, with a particular focus on structural fire modelling using finite element analysis. The focus in on validating finite element models against experimental results and quantifying the sensitivity of model outputs to relevant thermal and mechanical input parameters. A primary goal of the work is to provide recommendations to structural fire engineering analysts and designers considering the performance-based design of reinforced concrete slabs for structural fire resistance using available finite element software. A critical review of the available knowledge of the structural fire response of reinforced concrete structures in general and concrete slabs in particular is presented, along with an awareness as to the importance of understanding structural response of concrete structures exposed to fires. Current techniques for structural fire design of concrete structures are reviewed, and shortcomings highlighted. Available experimental data are presented, and various finite element models of these slabs are developed and interrogated to identify important aspects for understanding, as well as for future improvement of similar studies (both experimental and numerical) with the intention of supporting future progress in structural fire engineering, in particular as regards performance based structural fire design of concrete slabs. A range of thermal and mechanical parameters that are potentially important and influential in the structural fire design of reinforced concrete slabs is then studied, including: fire scenario, thermal properties of materials (thermal conductivity and specific heat), heat transfer parameters (coefficient of convection and emissivity) and assumptions, restraint conditions at the supports, variations of span-to-depth ratio, reinforcement detailing, as well as plan aspect ratio are all investigated; their influence on the structural fire response of reinforced concrete slabs is studied and discussed. A key issue in validating finite element models against experimental results lies in defining the temperature inputs to the structural finite element models correctly. Variation of available thermal and mechanical input parameters, as recommended in Eurocodes, influences the predictive performance of thermal and structural finite element models, however these are not the main contributing factors in obtaining a credible prediction of response from the finite element models. The most challenging aspect in performing heat transfer analysis for fire furnace tested reinforced concrete slabs lies in defining the correct thermal boundary condition. For simply supported one-way spanning and two-way spanning slabs, increasing slab's thickness (lowering span-depth ratio) does not improve fire resistance rating for the slabs when both limiting deflection criteria and limiting tensile plastic strain are set as acceptance criteria. Two-way slabs with higher span-depth ratio have better fire resistance ratings, judging from the overall trends and magnitudes of mid-span deflections. The formation of plastic hinges is likely to occur for one-way spanning slabs modelled with finite rotational spring stiffness at supports, but not for two-way spanning slabs. A yield line mechanism in two-way slabs means that the behaviour is more complex as compared to the simple flexural mechanism for one-way slabs. In one-way slabs, plastic hinges potentially occur at the location where top reinforcement is curtailed, highlighting the importance of properly understanding the nuances in response of concrete slabs in fire. Investigation of the influence of aspect ratio in two-way spanning slabs confirms that slabs with lower aspect ratios have better structural fire resistance than slabs with higher aspect ratios when both limiting deflection criteria and limiting tensile strain in reinforcing steel were used as the performance indicators. A combination of both limiting mid-span deflection criteria as well as limiting tensile plastic strain is recommended for specifying acceptance criteria for both one-way and two-way slabs, since it gives more accurate and comprehensive assessment on the structural response of the slabs under exposure to severe heating from below.

Temperature gradient causes volume change (elongation/shortening) in concrete structures. If the movement of the structure is restrained, significant stresses may occur on the structure. These stresses may be so significant that they can cause considerable cracking at structural components of large concrete structures. Thus, during the design of a concrete structure, the actual temperature gradient in the structure should be obtained in order to compute the stress distribution on the structure due to thermal effects. This study focuses on the implementation of a solution procedure for coupled thermal and structural analysis with finite element method for such structures. For this purpose, first transient heat transfer analysis algorithm is implemented to compute the thermal gradient occurring inside the concrete structures. Then, the output of the thermal analysis is combined with the linear static solution algorithm to compute stresses due to temperature gradient. Several, 2D and 3D, finite elements having both structural and thermal analysis capabilities are developed. The performances of each finite element are investigated. As a case study, the top floor of two L-shaped reinforced concrete parking structure and office building are analyzed. Both structures are subjected to heat convection at top face of the slabs as ambient condition. The bottom face of the slab of the parking structure has the same thermal conditions as the top face whereas in the office building the temperature inside the building is fixed to 20 degrees. The differences in the stress distribution of the slabs and the internal forces of the vertical structural members are discussed.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering / Steven J. Eckels / The current research presents the experimental investigation of the effect of tube pitch on enhanced tube bundles’ performance. The typical application of this research is flooded refrigerant evaporators. Boosting evaporator’s performance through optimizing tube spacing reduces cost and energy consumption. R-134a with the enhanced tube Turbo BII-HP and R-123 with Turbo BII-LP were used in this study. Three tube pitches were tested P/D 1.167, P/D 1.33, and P/D 1.5. Each tube bundle includes 20 tubes (19.05 mm outer diameter and 1 m long each) constructed in four passes. The test facility’s design allows controlling three variables, heat flux, mass flux, and inlet quality. The type of analysis used is local to one location in the bundle. This was accomplished by measuring the water temperature drop in the four passes. The water-side pressure drop is included in the data analysis. A new method called the EBHT (Enthalpy Based Heat Transfer) was introduced, which uses the water-side pressure drop in performing the heat transfer analysis. The input variables ranges are: 15-55 kg/m².s for mass flux, 5-60 kW/m² for heat flux, and 10-70% for inlet quality. The effect of local heat flux, local quality, and mass flux on the local heat transfer coefficient was investigated. The comparison between the bundle performance and single tube performance was included in the results of each tube bundle. The smallest tube pitch has the lowest performance in both refrigerants, with a significantly lower performance in the case of R-134a. However, the two bigger tube pitches have very similar performance at low heat flux. Moreover, the largest tube pitch performance approaches that of the single tube at medium and high heat fluxes. For the R-123 study, the smallest tube bundle experienced quick decease in performance at high qualities, exhibiting tube enhancement dry-out at certain flow rates and high qualities. The flow pattern effect was demonstrated by the dry-out phenomena. At medium and high heat fluxes, as the tube pitch increases, the performance approaches that of the single tube. All tube bundles experience quick decrease in performance at high qualities. Evidently, P/D 1.33 is the optimum tube pitch for the studied refrigerants and enhanced tubes combinations.

Many studies of the fire induced thermal and structural behaviour in large compartments, carried out over the past two decades, show a great deal of non-uniformity, unlike the homogeneous compartment temperature assumption in the current fire safety engineering practice. Furthermore, some large compartment fires may burn locally and they tend to move across entire floor plates over a period of time as the fuel is consumed. This kind of fire scenario is beginning to be idealized as 'travelling fires' in the context of performance‐based structural and fire safety engineering. However, the previous research of travelling fires still relies on highly simplified travelling fire models (i.e. Clifton's model and Rein's model); and no equivalent numerical tools can perform such simulations, which involves analysis of realistic fire, heat transfer and thermo-mechanical response in one single software package with an automatic coupled manner. Both of these hinder the advance of the research on performance‐based structural fire engineering. The author develops an extended travelling fire method (ETFM) framework and an integrated comprehensive tool with high computational expediency in this research, to address the above‐mentioned issues. The experiments conducted for characterizing travelling fires over the past two decades are reviewed, in conjunction with the current available travelling fire models. It is found that no performed travelling fire experiment records both the structural response and the mass loss rate of the fuel (to estimate the fire heat release rate) in a single test, which further implies closer collaboration between the structural and the fire engineers' teams are needed, especially for the travelling fire research topic. In addition, an overview of the development of OpenSees software framework for modelling structures in fire is presented, addressing its theoretical background, fundamental assumptions, and inherent limitations. After a decade of development, OpenSees has modules including fire, heat transfer, and thermo‐mechanical analysis. Meanwhile, it is one of the few structural fire modelling software which is open source and free to the entire community, allowing interested researchers to use and contribute with no expense. An OpenSees‐based integrated tool called SIFBuilder is developed by the author and co‐workers, which can perform fire modelling, heat transfer analysis, and thermo-mechanical analysis in one single software with an automatic coupled manner. This manner would facilitate structural engineers to apply fire loading on their design structures like other mechanical loading types (e.g. seismic loading, gravity loading, etc.), without transferring the fire and heat transfer modelling results to each structural element manually and further assemble them to the entire structure. This feature would largely free the structural engineers' efforts to focus on the structural response for performance-based design under different fire scenarios, without investigating the modelling details of fire and heat transfer analysis. Moreover, the efficiency due to this automatic coupled manner would become more superior, for modelling larger structures under more realistic fire scenarios (e.g. travelling fires). This advantage has been confirmed by the studies carried out in this research, including 29 travelling fire scenarios containing total number of 696 heat transfer analysis for the structural members, which were undertaken at very modest computational costs. In addition, a set of benchmark problems for verification and validation of OpenSees/SIFBuilder are investigated, which demonstrates good agreement against analytical solutions, ABAQUS, SAFIR, and the experimental data. These benchmark problems can also be used for interested researchers to verify their own numerical or analytical models for other purposes, and can be also used as an induction guide of OpenSees/SIFBuilder. Significantly, an extended travelling fire method (ETFM) framework is put forward in this research, which can predict the fire severity considering a travelling fire concept with an upper bound. This framework considers the energy and mass conservation, rather than simply forcing other independent models to 'travel' in the compartment (i.e. modified parametric fire curves in Clifton's model, 800°C‐1200°C temperature block and the Alpert's ceiling jet in Rein's model). It is developed based on combining Hasemi's localized fire model for the fire plume, and a simple smoke layer calculation by utilising the FIRM zone model for the areas of the compartment away from the fire. Different from mainly investigating the thermal impact due to various ratios of the fire size to the compartment size (e.g. 5%, 10%, 25%, 75%, etc.), as in Rein's model, this research investigates the travelling fire thermal impact through explicit representation of the various fire spread rates and fuel load densities, which are the key input parameters in the ETFM framework. To represent the far field thermal exposures, two zone models (i.e. ASET zone model & FIRM zone model) and the ETFM framework are implemented in SIFBuilder, in order to provide the community a 'vehicle' to try, test, and further improve this ETFM framework, and also the SIFBuilder itself. It is found that for 'slow' travelling fires (i.e. low fire spread rates), the near‐field fire plume brings more dominant thermal impact compared with the impact from far‐field smoke. In contrast, for 'fast' travelling fires (i.e. high fire spread rates), the far‐field smoke brings more dominant thermal impact. Furthermore, the through depth thermal gradients due to different travelling fire scenarios were explored, especially with regards to the 'thermal gradient reversal' due to the near‐field fire plume approaching and leaving the design structural member. This 'thermal gradient reversal' would fundamentally reverse the thermally‐induced bending moment from hogging to sagging. The modelling results suggest that the peak thermal gradient due to near‐field approaching is more sensitive to the fuel load density than fire spread rate, where larger peak values are captured with lower fuel load densities. Moreover, the reverse peak thermal gradient due to near‐field leaving is also sensitive to the fuel load density rather than the fire spread rate, but this reverse peak value is inversely proportional to the fuel load densities. Finally, the key assumptions of the ETFM framework are rationalised and its limitations are emphasized. Design instructions with relevant information which can be readily used by the structural fire engineers for the ETFM framework are also included. Hence more optimised and robust structural design under such fire threat can be generated and guaranteed, where we believe these efforts will advance the performance‐based structural and fire safety engineering.

The demands facing the refrigeration industry are minimal usage of conventional energy sources for compression and avoidance of ozone depleting substances. One of the approaches to combat these issues is the use of thermally driven solid sorption compression with non-ozone depleting refrigerant. In this context, the research work presented in this thesis is devoted to a comprehensive thermodynamic analysis and development of a laboratory model of an activated carbon+ HFC 134a adsorption refrigeration system. The cooling load catered to by the laboratory model is 2-5 W, mainly for thermal management of electronics. A complete thermodynamic analysis is carried out for the desorption temperatures varying from 75 to 90 oC, evaporating temperatures from -20 to 15oC and adsorption/condensing temperatures from 25 to 40 oC. A program on MatLab platform is developed for theoretical modeling. A new concept of thermal compression uptake efficiency (u) which is analogous to volumetric efficiency of a positive displacement compressor is introduced to consider the effect of void volume. The thesis also covers an investigation of two-stage and hybrid (thermal+ mechanical) cycle compression systems. It is possible to identify the conditions under which a two-stage gives a better performance than a single-stage one. It also shows that hybrid cycle system gives the best performance and saves ~40% of power compared to operation under the same conditions run with a single-stage mechanical compression refrigeration system. A heat transfer analysis of the thermal compressor is carried out to evaluate non-uniformities in bed temperature. As a part of it, the thermal conductivity of the bed under adsorbed state has been calculated. A laboratory model of activated carbon+ HFC 134a adsorption refrigeration system is fabricated to meet a 2-5 Watts cooling load based on the results from theoretical calculations. Experimental results show a fair match in the trends for the COP with analysis. The main aim of the research was to examine how effective the adsorption refrigeration system is in reducing the temperature rise of the heater used to simulate the electronic component. The heater that would have stabilized at 81, 97, 103 and 112 oC without any cooling for heat inputs of 3, 4, 4.4 and 4.9 W, respectively, would attain a cyclic steady state around 24, 26, 28, 31 oC. The influence of cycle time on the performance of the systems is also investigated. It is concluded that an activated carbon+ HFC 134a adsorption refrigeration system can be a good supplement to conventional compression refrigeration systems. In situations where heat recovery imminent this system could be a good choice. For waste heat recovery and suppression of infrared signatures of electronic components, it is ideally suited where COP becomes immaterial.