International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124

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International Journal of Thermal Sciences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijts

Natural convection heat transfer inside vertical circular enclosure lled with water-based Al2O3 nanouids
Mohamed Ali a, b, *, O. Zeitoun a, b, Salem Almotairi a
a b

King Saud University, College of Engineering, Mechanical Engineering Department, P. O. Box 800, Riyadh 11421, Saudi Arabia King Abdullah Institute for Nanotechnology, Saudi Arabia

a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history: Received 15 September 2011 Received in revised form 18 July 2012 Accepted 19 July 2012 Available online 24 August 2012 Keywords: Enclosure Nanouid Natural convection Experimental correlations

a b s t r a c t
Experimental investigation on natural convection heat transfer has been carried out inside vertical circular enclosures lled with Al2O3 nanouid with different concentrations; 0.0%, 0.85% (0.21%), 1.98 (0.51%) and 2.95% (0.75%) by mass (volume). Two enclosures are used with 0.20 m inside diameter and with two different aspect ratios. The bottom surface of the enclosure is heated using a constant heat ux exible heater while the upper surface is cooled by an ambient air stream. Various uniform heat uxes have been used to generate the natural convection heat transfer data. The average Nusselt number is obtained and correlated with the modied Rayleigh number at each concentration ratio of the nanouid. The average Nusselt number is obtained for each enclosure and correlated with the modied Rayleigh number using the concentration ratio as a parameter. The results show that the heat transfer coefcient increases as the concentration increases up to a specic value of the concentration and then it decreases as the concentration continues to increase compared to the basic uid of pure water. Furthermore, a general correlation is obtained using the volume fraction and the aspect ratio as parameters. 2012 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Natural convection heat transfer in enclosures has many engineering applications such as heating and cooling of buildings, solar collectors, double pane windows and many other applications. The comprehensive review of such enclosures has been reported by Ostrach [1]. Recently, nanouid is used as a working uid inside enclosures for its promising physical properties specially the thermal conductivity. A comparative numerical study of different models based on the physical properties of the nanouid was analyzed in detail by Khanafer et al. [2] for two-dimensional rectangular enclosure with differentially heated side walls. Their study has shown that the suspended nanoparticles substantially increase the heat transfer rate at any given Grashof number. In addition, their results have illustrated that nanouid heat transfer rate increases with an increase in the nanoparticles volume fraction. Jou and Tzeng [3] have studied numerically the heat transfer enhancement in a rectangular enclosure lled with nanouid. Their study has shown that increasing the buoyancy parameter and the

* Corresponding author. King Saud University, College of Engineering, Mechanical Engineering Department, P. O. Box 800, Riyadh 11421, Saudi Arabia. Tel.: 966 1 467 6672; fax: 966 1 467 6652. E-mail address: mali@ksu.edu.sa (M. Ali). 1290-0729/$ e see front matter 2012 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijthermalsci.2012.07.008

volume fraction of nanouids causes an increase in the average heat transfer coefcient. Hwang et al. [4] have shown theoretically that inside a rectangular cavity heated from below the ratio of heat transfer coefcient of the nanouids to that of the base uid decreases as the size of nanoparticles increases. Putra et al. [5] have conducted an experimental study of Al2O3 nanouid natural convection in a horizontal cylindrical cavity heated from one side and cooled from the other. Their results showed heat transfer deterioration with increasing both the nanoparticle concentration and the aspect ratio. Natural convection of Titanium oxide nanouid in a circular enclosure heated from below has been reported by Wen and Ding [6]. In their experimental study they have shown a systematic decrease in the natural convection heat transfer coefcient with increasing the particle concentration. The inuences due to adopting various formulas for the effective thermal conductivity and dynamic viscosity of alumina-water nanouid on the heat transfer characteristics have been investigated numerically for natural convection in a vertical square enclosure by Ho et al. [7]. Their results have revealed that, in contrast to the numerical results in [2], using the nanouid inside the enclosure does not always result in an increase of the averaged Nusselt number. This behavior depends mainly on the Rayleigh number as well as the formulas used for the effective dynamic viscosity. Heat transfer enhancement using copperewater nanouid in a two dimensional enclosure has been numerically studied for a wide range of Rayleigh

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number and a solid volume fraction by Santra et al. [8]. Their results agreed with [5] and [6] where the average Nusselt number steadily decreased for increasing the nanoparticle concentration for some Rayleigh numbers however, it increased with the Rayleigh number for a particular concentration. Santra et al. [9] have conrmed the results of [8] by considering the nanouid to be non-Newtonian using neural network. Chang et al. [10] have showed, for circular enclosure lled with Al2O3 nanouid and heated from below, also a decrease in Nusselt number compared to that of the pure water. This behavior was pronounced at lower Rayleigh number and higher particle concentration. Oztop and Abu-Nada [11] have reported a numerical study of natural convection in partially heated vertical rectangular enclosures lled with nanouids. In their results they have found that the heat transfer enhancement is more pronounced at low aspect ratio than at high aspect ratio. Localised heat source at the bottom of a nanouid lled enclosure has been studied numerically by Aminossadati and Ghasemi [12]. Their results indicated that adding nanoparticles into pure water improves its cooling performance especially at low Rayleigh numbers. Similar results have been obtained by Ghasemi and Aminossadati [13] using an oscillating heat ux on the left wall of a vertical enclosure. Kumar et al. [14] have shown numerically an increase in the average Nusselt number as the solid volume fraction increases using four different models of thermo-physical nanouids in a vertical enclosure. Abu-Nada et al. [15] have shown that using nanouids in a vertical enclosure reduces the average Nusselt number for high Rayleigh number as the volume fraction increases however, a slight increase in the Nusselt number was observed at low Rayleigh number as the volume fraction increases. Numerical and analytical analyses have done by Alloui et al. [16] for natural convection of nanouids in a shallow cavity heated from below. Their results showed that when the Rayleigh number is relatively small and below a value that depends upon both concentrations and the type of nanouid, it was found that the heat transfer is less than that for pure water. On the other hand, above this value, this trend was reversed and depended on the type of nanouids. Ho et al. [17] have shown experimentally that the efcacy of applying the nanouid for natural convection heat transfer enhancement in enclosure is inferred to be generally infeasible. They have also reported that the average heat transfer rate across the differentially heated vertical enclosure revealed systematic heat transfer degradation for the nanouid containing nanoparticles of 2% (vol.) over the entire range of the Rayleigh number. However, for the nanouid containing much lower particle fraction of 0.1% (vol.), a heat transfer enhancement of around 18% compared with that of water was found at sufciently high Rayleigh number. Li and Peterson [18] have reported a heat transfer deterioration of the Al2O3 water nanouid in an enclosure heated from above. On the other hand, Yu et al. [19] have reported that at constant Grashof numbers the time averaged Nusselt number was lowered as more nanoparticles were added to the base liquid and would be overestimated if the browning motion effects were not considered. Natural convection in tilted enclosure lled with different nanouids has been reported numerically by Kahveci [20]. His results showed an increase in the average heat transfer rate by various amounts depends on the Rayleigh number and the inclination angle of the enclosure. The effect of non-uniform particle diameter and temperature on the thermal conductivity of nanouids in a vertical enclosure has been studied by Lin and Violi [21]. As seen, from the previous review of natural convection in rectangular and square enclosures lled with nanouids, the averaged Nusselt number decreases as the volume fraction of the nanoparticles increases and this behavior mostly supported by experimental studies. On the other hand, other studies have shown the reverse effect and this is mostly supported by numerical

studies. In the present study experiments have done on natural convection heat transfer in vertical circular enclosures heated from below using Al2O3 nanouid with four various concentrations; 0.0, 0.21, 0.51 and 0.75 percentage by volume. 2. Experimental apparatus The enclosure experimental apparatus is shown in Fig. 1 where all components used in the present study are shown. The main component of the experimental test rig is the enclosure which is shown in details in Fig. 1(a). As seen in this gure, two circular enclosures (7) are made of Bakelite (k 0.15 W/mK [22]) with an inside diameter of 0.20 m and with two different aspect ratios (k L/D 0.0635 and 0.127). The outer dimensions of the enclosures are 0.30 0.30 m2. The Bakelite enclosure is sandwiched between two nickel electroplated copper plates (5) of dimensions 0.30 0.30 0.005 m3 (k 398 W/mK [22]). Two gasket sheets (6) are placed between the Bakelite and the copper plate to prevent any leakage problem. The enclosure is heated using a exible foil heater (4) with a diameter of 0.20 m, a maximum thickness of 2.54 104 m (0.01in), and a maximum power of 1.55 104 W/m2 (10 W/in2). The heater is insulated by a Bakelite material (2) whose dimensions are 0.30 0.30 0.02 m3 followed by an insulating material made of polystyrene (1) (k 0.035 W/mK [22]) 0.30 0.30 0.10 m3. The enclosure parts (2e7) are assembled as one unit in the same order as it shown in Fig. 1(aeb) using six 0.012 m bolts as shown in Fig. 1(c). Fig. 1(c) also shows two holes on the sides of the enclosure used for two-way valves (8): one for lling the enclosure and the other for ventilation. The surface temperatures are measured at eleven points along the diameter of the enclosure 0.02 m apart below the heater (shown as little holes in Fig. 1(a)) at the bottom copper surface (hot surface (5)) and similar temperature measurements are taken at the top copper surface (cold surface (5)). In order to calculate the heat which may leakage away from the enclosure cavity, eleven more thermocouples are distributed along the lower surface of the covering Bakelite plate (3) as seen in Fig. 1(a). Four more thermocouples are distributed on the outer surfaces of the enclosure, one on each side to measure the heat leakage from the sides. Chromel Alumel (type K) self adhesive thermocouples (0.3 s time response with attened bead) are used to measure the surface temperatures as explained earlier. Those thermocouples are connected to a 40-channels data acquisition system, which in turn are connected to a computer where the measured temperatures are stored for further analysis. It should be mentioned that the cold surface (copper) (5) is subject to a stream of ambient air of 5 m/s using a fan as shown in Fig. 1(d) to help in cooling the surface. It is worth mentioning that the consumed power, by the heater, is measured by a Wattmeter and uniformly distributed (as specied by the manufacturer) across the cavity. The heat ux is calculated by dividing the consumed power (after deducting the heat lost from the back side of the heater and from the enclosure sides by conduction) by the surface area as will be seen in the experimental analyses section. Heat transfer data are generated by controlling the input power to the heater such that for each enclosure at least six power intervals are chosen, while making sure that the maximum hot plate surface temperature does not exceed 90  C to avoid the possible boiling of the nanouid. 3. The tested uid The alumina nanouid (Al2O3 dispersed in water) used in the present study is supplied by the Nanostructured and Amorphous Materials, Inc. (USA) with a mass concentration of 20%. The specications provided by the manufacturer are given in Table 1. In order to characterize the size of the particles, a sample of the diluted

M. Ali et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124

117

Fig. 1. Schematic of the enclosure; (a) enclosure parts, (1) polystyrene, (2) Bakelite, (3) thermocouples, (4) heater, (5) copper plates, (6) gasket sheet, (7) circular enclosure, (8) twoway valve, (b) assembled enclosure, (c) bolts and valve locations and (d) complete setup.

dispersed suspension provided by the manufacturer (20 m%) is dried and ground into ne particles. Fig. 2 shows the secondary electron imaging using a Scanning Electron Microscope (JEOL6610LV) (SEM). As seen in this gure the minimum size is around 311 nm and some are agglomerated to bigger sizes. The highly concentrated nanouid provided by the manufacturer was diluted to 0.85%, 1.98% and 2.95% by mass using distilled pure water. These new diluted solutions are ultrasonically vibrated to insure complete dispersions of the nanoparticles and to be sure that agglomerations seen in Fig. 2 are broken to some extent into nanometer range [5]. The equivalent volume fractions of the diluted mass percentage are 0.21%, 0.51% and 0.75% respectively. The stability of the nanouid samples is checked by taking a photo of the sample just after the ultrasonic vibration and two days later where no precipitation is

observed in those two days period. The nanouid physical properties equations provided by Williams et al. [23] are used, since the particle sizes in their experiments are similar to the ones in the current experiment,

Table 1 Specications of the nanouid as provided by the manufacturer for concentration ratio 20% by mass. Average particle size Dynamics viscosity Appearance pH value Purity 10 nm 40 cP (at 20  C) Transparent liquid 4.5 99.9%

Fig. 2. SEM photographs of nanoparticles show the agglomeration to bigger sizes.

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rf frp 1 frb frp Cp 1 frb Cb Cf rf

kf kb 1 4:5503f 

(1)

0.05 0.03 Value reported by the manufacturer at 20 oC +20% -20%

(2) (3)
f , Pa s

0.02

0.01
0.005 0.003

mf mb exp

4:91f 0:2092 f

 (4)

0.002

where f is the nanoparticles volumetric concentration ratio. The relation between mass concentration c and volumetric concentration f can be estimated from the following equation and Eq. (1),

0.001
0.0005 0 4 8

Measured viscosity Calculated from Eq. (4) Williams et al. [23] 12 16 20

rf

c 1 c rp rb

, %
Fig. 4. Nanouid viscosity at 24.5  C.

(5)

Nanouid density is measured using DMA 35N density meter provided by Anton Paar GmbH. Fig. 3 shows the effect of mass concentration on the measured nanouid density at an ambient temperature of 25.5  C. The Nanouid viscosity at an ambient temperature 24.5  C is measured using Viscolite 700 Portable Viscometer manufactured by Hydramotion Viscosity. The Effect of nanoparticles concentration on viscosity is shown in Fig. 4. Comparison with measurements of Williams et al. [23] is also shown in this gure. The measured viscosity falls within 20% of Eq. (4) where those differences could be related to the accuracy of the used viscometer. Nanouid thermal conductivity is measured using KD2Pro manufactured by Decagon Devices, Inc. The Effect of nanoparticles concentration on thermal conductivity is shown in Fig. 5 along with the results of [23] for comparison. The measured thermal conductivity falls within 5% of Eq. (3). The conversion between mass and volume fraction (f) was done through the bulk density of alumina as shown by Eq. (5). The physical properties of Al2O3 nanoparticles are given in Table 2 [13]. 4. Experimental analyses The heat generated by the heater is dissipated through the copper hot plate and then to the uid medium by convection. In addition to that, there is heat lost through the Bakelite sides and the lower Bakelite plate by conduction. It should be mentioned that the radiation heat transfer is neglected since the uid is liquid with a maximum temperature of 80  C.

Q total IV Q Bk:b Q Bk:s Q cv Q Bk:b ABk:b kBk Th TBk

(6)

dBk:b

(7)

Q Bk:s ABk:s kBk

Tf Ts

dBk:s

(8) (9)

Q cv IV Q Bk:b Q Bk:s

Where Qtotal is the electrical input power, QBk.b is the heat lost by conduction through the Bakelite plate below the heater towards the insulation layer (if any), QBk.s is the heat lost by conduction through the Bakelite sides of the enclosure, Qcv is the heat transfer by convection through the uid in the vertical direction and ABk.b and ABk.s are the surface area of the Bakelite plate below the heater and the Bakelite sides respectively. It should be noted that, all physical properties of the nanouid are evaluated at the mean temperature of the nanouid Tf Th Tc =2. It is also assumed that the Bakelite sides inner temperature is equal to Tf in calculating the heat lost from the sides. WhereTc , Th and TBk are the average surface temperatures of the cold, hot and Bakelite surfaces respectively and Ts is the Bakelite outside average side temperature. Measurements show that, the fraction of the heat lost by conduction through the Bakelite plate below the heater and that from the Bakelite sides are 4.7% and 1.3% respectively at most.
0.8 Measured thermal conductivity Calculated from Eq. (3) Williams et al. [23] +5%

1200

1100

0.7

f , kg/m3

k f, W/mK

-5% 0.6

1000
Measured density Calculated from Eq. (5)

900 0 4 8 12 16 20

0.5

, %
Fig. 3. Nanouid density at ambient temperature of 25.5  C.

, %

12

Fig. 5. Nanouid thermal conductivity at 26.5  C.

M. Ali et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124 Table 2 The physical properties of Al2O3 nanoparticles used in Eqs. (4)e(8). The bulk density The thermal conductivity The thermal expansion coefcient 3970 kg/m3 40 W/mK 0.0000085 1/K

119

And the average heat transfer coefcient can be obtained as:

1 # " 2Dxcopper T Tc A h Q cv Acopper kcopper

(14)

Table 3 The maximum percentage uncertainties of various quantities. Quantity Qtotal qcv h Ra* Nu Range (%) 2.09 2.33 8.52 2.81 8.53

The non-dimensional average Nusselt number, the modied Rayleigh numbers and the ordinary Rayleigh numbers are obtained as:

Nu

hL k

(15)

a 2.8
4.1. Average heat transfer coefcient h In this case the average surface temperatures are used to calculate the average heat transfer coefcient at each convection heat transfer Qcv

5215.9 4517.2
2.4

Q cv

T Tc P h R
P

q" = 3110 W/m 2

(10)
t/t 1.6 2.0

Where

R is the overall enclosure thermal resistance given by:

2044.4 1106.6
1.2

R Rcopper Rfluid Rcopper

(11) 1 Ah

Rcopper

Dxcopper ; Acopper kcopper

Rfluid

(12)

513.7

Where the copper surface area Acopper is equal to the convection surface area A of the enclosure, kcopper 398 W/m K [22] and Dxcopper is the thickness of the copper plate. By substituting Eqs. (11) and (12) into (10), the heat transfer through the enclosure is obtained:

= 0.75% vol
0.8 0.0 0.2 0.4 x /D 0.6

Cold surface
0.8 1.0

Q cv

Th Tc Dxcopper 1 2 Acopper kcopper Ah

b
(13)

5.0
= 0.75% vol Hot surface

4.0
50 Unsteady state 40 Steady state

5215.9

t/t 3.0

4517.2 q" = 3110 W/m2

Temperature, oC

30

2044.4
20

2.0

1106.6
10

C o ld S u rfa c e H o t S u rfa c e

513.7
1.0 0.0 0.2 0.4 x /D
Fig. 7. Temperature distribution along the diameter of the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635) lled with nanouid of concentration 0.75% by volume (2.95%m); (a) cold surface and (b) hot surface.

0 0 200 400 600 800

0.6

0.8

1.0

Time, minutes
Fig. 6. Samples of temperature variation with time showing the steady state condition for the enclosure (k 0.0635).

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M. Ali et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124

Ra*

g bQ cv L4 g bDTL3 ; and Ra na knaA

(16)

4.2. Experimental uncertainty In this section, the experimental uncertainty is to be estimated in the calculated results on the basis of the uncertainties in the primary measurements. It should be mentioned that some of the experiments are repeated more than twice to check the calculated results and the general trends of the data. The error in measuring the temperature and in calculating the surface area is 0.2  C, and 1.57 105 m2, respectively. The accuracy in measuring the voltage is taken from the manual of the Wattmeter as 0.5% of

reading 2 counts with a resolution of 0.1 V and the corresponding one for the current is 0.7% of reading 5 counts 1 mA with a resolution of 1 mA. At each run, forty scans of the temperature measurement are collected by the data acquisition system for each channel and the mathematical averages of those scans are obtained. Using the above mentioned errors turns to maximum itemized uncertainties of the calculated results shown in Table 3 using the method recommended by Moffat [24]. The uncertainties of the measured density, viscosity and thermal conductivity data presented in Figs. 3e5 as given by the manufacturers user manuals are: 0.001 g/cm3, 2% of the reading above 0.01 Pa s (10 cP) and 0.0005 Pa s (0.5 cP) for readings below 0.01 Pa s (10 cP), and 5% from 0.2 to 2 W/(m K) and 0.01 W/(m K) from 0.02 to 0.2 W/(m K) respectively. 5. Results and discussion

10.0 = 0.0635 8 6
Temperature measurements are taken at steady state conditions which normally reached at the maximum of 300 min as seen in Fig. 6 for a sample rate of thirty samples per minute. Fig. 7(a, b) show some samples of the temperature distribution along the diameter of the cold and hot surfaces of the enclosure respectively for the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635) lled with nanouid of f 0.75% concentration by volume (2.95% by mass). It is clear in these gures that; as the heat ux increases the surface temperature increases and its maximum located near the center of the circular enclosure and

Nu

a
2

10
Eq. (17 ) Ideal

Nu pred

2.95% m (0.75% vol) 1.98% m (0.51% vol) 0.85% m (0.21% vol) 0.00% m (0.00% vol)
1.0 1E+5 1E+6 1E+7

+10%

-10%

Ra *

10

= 0.127

2 2 4 6 8 10

Nu exp

b
8

10
Eq. (18) Ideal

Nu
N u pred

+5%

-5%

0.00% m (0.00% vol) 0.85% m (0.21% vol) 1.98% m (0.51% vol) 2.95% m (0.75% vol)
6 1E+6 1E+7 1E+8 1E+9

6 6 7 8 9 10

Ra *
Fig. 8. Effect of nanouid concentration on Nusselt number as function of the modied Rayleigh number in the enclosure (a) k 0.0635 and (b) k 0.127.

N u exp
Fig. 9. The correlation and band width of the predicted and the experimental Nusselt numbers of the enclosure (a) k 0.0635 and (b) k 0.127.

M. Ali et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124

121

10

Eq. (19) Ideal +10% -10%

N u pred

experimental Nusselt number in Fig. 10(a, b) for the two enclosures respectively. The solid lines present the perfect t whereas the dashed lines present the error band width of 10% in Fig. 10(a) and are 5% in Fig. 9(b). Furthermore, the overall correlation covering both enclosures is obtained using the enclosures aspect ratio k as a parameter

0:119    1 44:097f 6943:36f2 k0:137 ; Nu 1:426 Ra* 3 105  Ra*  1:3 108 19

2 2 4 6 8 10

a
N u exp

= 0.0635

Ra*= 5x106 =3x106 =1x106

Fig. 10. The correlation and band width of the predicted and the experimental Nusselt numbers for both enclosures using the aspect ratio k as a parameter.

decreases as it moves towards the edges of the enclosure due to the end effects. It should be noted that other concentrations have similar temperature proles. The heat transfer coefcient is presented in a dimensionless form of the average Nusselt number in Fig. 8(a, b) as a function of the modied Rayleigh number for both enclosures. As seen in Fig. 8(a) for the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635) the average Nu increases for small volume fraction over that of the base uid at a xed Ra*. However as the modied Rayleigh number increases more, enhancement can be seen in Nu for small volume fraction. Furthermore, as the volume fraction increases more a decrease in Nu is noticed (f 0.75% vol.) below that of the base uid. In other words, enhancement in Nu occurs for f  0.51% (vol.) and deterioration in Nu is obtained beyond that. This observation could be attributed to the competition between the increase of both thermal conductivity and viscosity of the nanouid as the volume fraction increases. However, for volume fraction f > 0.51% the effect of viscosity is dominated which in turns deteriorates the heat transfer as seen as a decrease of Nu. It should be noted that similar observations are obtained by [5, 10, 15, 17, and 19]. Fig. 8(b) shows the effect of enclosure aspect ratio on the natural convection using nanouid where the behavior is the same as that of Fig. 8(a) however the experimental data getting close to each other but with the same trend as explained in Fig. 8(a). It should be noted that the data for the wide gap enclosure are close to each other and cant clearly be distinct. Comparison between Fig. 8(a) and (b) shows that the heat transfer enhancement is more pronounced at low aspect ratio than at high aspect one as previously observed by [5] and [11]. The average Nusselt numbers presented in Fig. 8(a, b) are correlated in terms of Ra* and the particle volume fraction (0  f  0.75% vol.). The correlation for the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635) is obtained as:

Nu
6

4 0.00

0.20

0.40

0.60

0.80

%
b 10

= 0.127

Ra*= 1x108

Nu

Ra*=2x107
8

0:155    1 106:346f 17286:975f2 ; Nu 0:571 Ra* 3 105  Ra*  9 106 17

with a condence coefcient R2 95.9%. The corresponding correlation for the other enclosure (k 0.127) is given by

Ra*= 6x106
7 0.00

0:097    1 12:814f 2055:99f2 ; Nu 1:603 Ra* 4 106  Ra*  1:3 108 18

0.20

0.40

0.60

0.80

%
Fig. 11. Effect of nanouid concentration on Nusselt number for different values of the modied Rayleigh numbers, (a) k 0.0635 and (b) k 0.127.

with a condence coefcient R2 99%. The predicted Nusselt numbers from the above correlations are plotted against the

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M. Ali et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 63 (2013) 115e124

with a condence coefcient R2 99%. This correlation is presented in Fig. 10 with the experimental data and band width of 10%. Fig. 11(a) shows the average Nusselt number developed from Eq. (17) for different values of the modied Rayleigh number for the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635). It is clear that for any Ra* as the nanoparticle volume fraction increases the Nusselt number increases over that of the base uid (water) up to a specic value then it decreases; this specic value is detected from the current experimental data to be 0.6 > f > 0.51% (vol.). Therefore, the qualitative critical values of f z 0.6% which pointed out by the downward arrow in Fig. 11(a) is the critical value of the volume fraction where beyond this value a degradation of the natural convection should be occurred. Fig. 11(b) shows similar behavior for the Nusselt numbers derived from Eq. (18) for the other

enclosure (k 0.127). Observation of Fig. 11 suggests that in order to get quantitative values of the Nu and f corresponding to the maximum Nusselt number and the critical values of f, one must repeat the experiment for different many concentrations to get piecewise curves for various Ra*. In order to quantify the natural convection heat transfer further following [17], Fig. 12(a, b) presents the results of the average heat transfer coefcient ratio between the current Alumina nanouid and the base uid versus the average temperature difference across the enclosures DT Th Tc . This comparison of the base uid

Leong et al. [26]

7 Inaba [25]

1.6

0.85% m (0.21% Vol.) 1.98% m (0.51% Vol.) 2.95% m (0.75% Vol.)

1.4

Nu 4
1.2

h f/h b

1.0

0.8
2

15 % Water (0.00%vol)

1E+5
0.6 0 4 8
T( C)
o

1E+6

Ra
12 16 20

9 8

1.12

Ho et al. [7] 10%

0.85% m (0.21% vol) 1.98% m (0.51% vol) 2.95% m (0.75% vol)

1.08

1.04

h f/h b

Nu

1.00
4

0.96

0.85% m (0.21%vol)

0.92 0 5 10
T( C)
Fig. 12. Heat transfer coefcient ratio of nanouid to its base uid for various temperature differences across the enclosures (a) k 0.0635 and (b) k 0.127.

1E+5
15 20 25

1E+6

Ra
Fig. 13. Comparison between the current experimental results and those in the literature, (a) with Inaba [25] and Leong et al. [26] for water 4 0.0% vol. and (b) with Ho et al. [7] for 4 0.21% vol.

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shows that the enhancement of the heat transfer coefcient could attain an increase of up to 40% for f 0.21% and an average degradation of about 20% for f 0.75% (vol.) as shown in Fig. 12(a) for the shallow enclosure (k 0.0635). However, on the other enclosure (k 0.127) a maximum enhancement of only about 8% could be attained and this happened using a volume fraction mostly less than 0.75% (vol.) and it degrades the heat transfer coefcient by about 4% which mostly happened using f 0.75%. It could be concluded that the aspect ratio of the enclosure plays a very important role in enhancing the heat transfer coefcient ([5] and [11]) of the nanouid over that of the base uid. In order to compare the present results with those in the literature; Rayleigh number is calculated and used in Fig. 13(a, b). It can be seen in Fig. 13(a) that the present results for the base uid f 0.0% lie within the predication of Inaba [25] for air cavity heated from below. The dashed lines show an error band width of 15% where 92% of the data are inside this error band. Other correlation for Leong et al. [26] for a cubical air lled cavity is also shown and lies in the limit of the error band. These differences could be attributed to the different aspect ratio and due to the side wall effect. On the other hand, the correlation of Ho et al. [7] for vertical cavity heated from a side using their model II of viscosity and thermal conductivity for f 0.21% (vol.) is shown in Fig. 13(b) for qualitative comparison. An error band width of 10% is observed between the current experimental data and those of [7]. It should be noted that, the differences between the current experimental results and those in Fig. 13(b) is expected due to the different aspect ratio and the heating boundary conditions and orientation associated with [7]. 6. Conclusions Natural convection heat transfer using Alumina nanouid in a vertical circular enclosure heated from below is studied for two gap aspect ratios k 0.0635 and 0.127. Results show that increasing the nanouid concentration enhances the heat transfer coefcient over that of the base uid for small volume fraction ratio f  0.51% (vol.). However, for f > 0.51% it degrades the heat transfer coefcient. The enhancement percentage of the heat transfer coefcient is aspect ratio dependent for example it increases by a maximum of 40% for the shallow enclosure k 0.0635 and only by 8% for k 0.127 using the same volume fraction f 0.21%. Furthermore, using f 0.75% degrades the heat transfer coefcient by about 20% for k 0.0635 and by 4% for k 0.127 from that of the base uid. General correlations are obtained for the average Nusselt numbers verses the modied Rayleigh numbers using the volume concentration ratio as a parameter for each enclosure (Eqs. (17) and (18)). Finally, an overall correlation is obtained for both enclosures using the aspect ratio as a parameter (Eq. (19)). Acknowledgement This research is supported by King Abdullah Institute for Nanotechnology at King Saud University under the project number Nano 1429/54. This support is highly appreciated and acknowledged. Nomenclature A C D g h I area, m2 specic heat, kJ/kg K Enclosure inside diameter, m2 acceleration due to gravity, m/s2 heat transfer coefcient, W m2 K1 current, Ampere

k m L Nu Qtotal Qcv qcv R Ra* Ra T DT t V vol. x

thermal conductivity, W m1 K1 mass, kg enclosure height, m average Nusselt number, hL=k Electrical input power, W convection heat transfer, W convection heat ux, Qcv/A, W/m2 Thermal resistance, W/K Modied Rayleigh number, gbqcL4n1a1k1 Rayleigh number, gbDTH3/an temperature, K Th Tc temperature,  C voltage, volt volume distance along the diameter, m

Greek symbols a thermal diffusivity, m2 s1 b coefcient for thermal expansion, K1 d Bakelite thickness, m k aspect ratio, (L/D) m dynamic viscosity, Pa s n kinematics viscosity, m2 s1 r density, kg/m3 f volume concentration ratio c mass concentration ratio Subscripts Bk Bakelite material Bk.b Bakelite surface Bk.s Bakelite side b base uid (water) c cold exp experimental data f nanouid h hot p nanoparticle pred predicted data N ambient condition Superscripts e average quantity References
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