Heat exchange systems used in everything from cars to microelectronics have rapidly advanced in recent years to offer high heat transfer rates in increasingly smaller sizes. However, these systems have become essentially optimized using conventional heat transfer fluids. To test the viability of nanofluids as a new heat transfer fluid, an experimental investigation was designed using a constant pressure drop configuration to drive flow into a heated square microchannel test section. The experimental trials included seven different test fluids tested over varying concentrations and surfactant use. Two identical test sections were used to collect results on heat transfer rates, pressure drop, mass flowrate and pumping power for all fluids. These results show a heat transfer improvement for nanofluids of 8-16% over pure water, with no meaningful increase in pumping power. This result is highly desirable, as it indicates an easily obtainable heat transfer improvement without an associated pumping cost increase. Importantly, the experiment shows the potential viability of nanofluids for heat transfer applications, while acknowledging limitations such as long term nanofluid stability. / text
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UTEXAS/oai:repositories.lib.utexas.edu:2152/ETD-UT-2011-05-3571 |
| Date | 17 June 2011 |
| Creators | Byrne, Matthew Davidson |
| Source Sets | University of Texas |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
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