Effect of heat flux on pool boiling heat transfer enhancement (numerical investigation approach)

This study presents numerical investigation results of heat flux effect on pool boiling heat transfer enhancement during nucleate boiling heat transfer of water. The simulation was performed for five different heated surfaces such as: brass, copper, mild steel, stainless steel and aluminum using ANSYS simulation software at 1 atmospheric pressure. The samples were heated in a domain developed for bubble growth during nucleate boiling process under the same operational condition of applied heat flux ranged from 100 to 1000 kW/m2 and their corresponding heat transfer coefficient was obtained numerically. Obtained experimental data of other authors from the open literature result is in close agreement with the simulated data, thus confirming the validity of the CFD simulation method used in this study. It is found that heat transfer coefficient increases with increasing heat flux. The results revealed that in comparison to other materials tested, better heat transfer performance up to 38.5% and 7.11% is observed for aluminum and brass at lower superheated temperature difference conditions of 6.96K and 14.01K respectively. This behavior indicates better bubble development and detachment capability of these heating surface materials and could be used in improving the performance of thermal devices toward producing compact and miniaturized equipment.