Evaluation of flow maldistribution in air-cooled heat exchangers

Investigation of the evaluation of flow maldistribution in air-cooled heat exchangers is presented. The flow field in the inlet and return headers was obtained through the numerical solution of the governing partial differential equations including the conservation equations of mass and momentum in addition to the equations of the turbulence model. The effects of the number of nozzles, nozzle location, nozzle geometry, nozzle diameter, inlet flow velocity and the incorporation of a second header on the flow maldistribution inside the tubes of an air-cooled heat exchanger were investigated using a 3-D computational method. The results are presented in terms of the standard deviations of the mass flow rate and static pressure in addition to the distributions in the static pressure inside the inlet header of the air-cooled heat exchanger. The results indicate that reducing the nozzle diameter results in an increase in the flow maldistribution. 25% increase is obtained in the standard deviation as a result of decreasing the diameter by 25%. Increasing the number of nozzles has a significant influence on the flow maldistribution. A reduction of 62.5% in the standard deviation of the mass flow rate inside the tubes is achieved by increasing the number of nozzles from 2 to 4. The results indicate that incorporating a second header results in a significant reduction in the flow maldistribution. Fifty percent decrease in the standard deviation is achieved as a result of incorporation of a second header of 7 holes. The results indicate that the mass flow rate and the static pressure distributions become uniform at the inlet of the second pass.