Faculty Advisor

Shigeo Hayashibara

Document Type

Article

Publication/Presentation Date

5-2020

Abstract/Description

Heating Ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) is a system which changes the temperature of the surroundings for the purposes of cooling or heating. This system requires energy to maintain a temperature difference from the outside temperature. Optimizing the flow over the evaporator coils is one way to increase the cooling efficiency. This will reduce the power required to have a sustainable system. Optimizing the flow to increase the energy transfer between the fins and the incoming air could result in a greater Coefficient of Performance (COP). This will be achieved by changing the geometry of the tubes for greater interaction with the flow. For reduced recirculation, an oval design for the tube geometry was chosen. These studies will be simulated using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) as the main comparison between the different models. The different models will be a standard oval shaped tube geometry with 20 degrees angles of attack alternating through the rows. This method could, in theory, increase the overall heat transfer coefficient of the heat exchanger because of more mixing of the flow through the evaporator. In conclusion, this study will analyze the effects of changing the geometry and alternating the angle of attack of the evaporator tubes along rows, on the overall heat transfer and pressure drop across the model.

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