Universidad de La Serena

Facultad de Ingeniera
Departamento de Ingeniera Mecnica
Transferencia de Calor

Heat Conduction in Polar Coordinates

Homework No. 3

GONZALO SALFATE MALDONADO

PROFESSOR: Ph.D. NELSON MORAGA BENAVIDES

September 13, 2017

Abstract
The unsteady state heat diffusion in a two-dimensional semicircular solid with internal heat
source and mixed boundary conditions was studied. The problem is solved using the finite
volume method in the program CONDUCT and by the finite difference method. A study of
the mesh effect was carried out. The results given by the program were quite similar with the
FDM .
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Contents
1.Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 3
2.Physical Situation ................................................................................................................ 3
2.1. Unsteady Conduction with Heat Generation ............................................................... 3
3.Mathematical Model ............................................................................................................ 4
4.Metodology.......................................................................................................................... 4
5. Computational Implementation .......................................................................................... 5
6.Results ................................................................................................................................. 5
7. Results Analysis and Discussion ........................................................................................ 7
8.Conclusions ......................................................................................................................... 7
9.Appendix ............................................................................................................................. 7
9.1. System of linear equations........................................................................................... 8
10.References ......................................................................................................................... 8

1.Introduction
There are three basic mechanism of heat
transfer, conduction, convection and
radiation. Conduction is the transfer of
energy from the more energetic particles
of a substance to the adjacent, less
energetic ones as a result of interactions
between the particles. Convection is the
mode of heat transfer between a solid
surface and the adjacent liquid or gas that
is in motion, and it involves the
combined effects of conduction and fluid
motion. Radiation is the energy
emitted by matter in the form of
electromagnetic waves. All modes of heat
transfer require the existence of a
temperature difference, and all modes are
from the high-temperature medium to a
lower-temperature one [1].
Many engineering problems involves heat
conduction, like dwelling thermal
isolation, heat loss in heat exchangers, heat
transfer from finned surfaces, heat
treatment, etc. Therefore, is important to
have a very good understanding of this
heat transfer mechanism, its governing
equations and the different kinds of
boundary conditions that could be involve
in this sort of problems.
In the context of heat conduction in 2-D
domains, we shall study a general problem
in a semicircular domain that involve
different kind of boundary conditions at
the same time, which is illustrated in
Pantakars book Computation of
Conduction and Duct Flow Heat
Transfer [2].
3
The problem is solved using the finite
volume method (FVM) in the open source
program CONDUCT [2], and with the
finite difference method in a 7x7 grid.
2.Physical Situation
2.1. Unsteady Conduction with Heat
Generation
The physical layout for the 2D usteady
state heat diffusion in a semicircular solid
with heat generation and mixed boundary
conditions is shown in the figure 1. We use
polar coordinates (, ) due to the
semicircular geometry. The parameters are
dimensionless because are only reference
for the understanding of this situation [2].
Figure 1. Semicircular solid with heat generation
between R1 and R2.
1 = 0.5 2 = 0.75 3 = 1.5 are
radius.
Where = 1000 is the source term (heat
generation); is the thermal conductivity.
0 = 50 , = 100 , = 20 are
temperatures, = 5 is the heat transfer
coefficient and = 60 is a constant heat
flux.
In this case only one half of the domain is
being calculated owing to the symmetry of
the geometry.
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3.Mathematical Model In the finite difference method (MDF) we

The unsteady state 2D heat conduction in
a semicircular solid with internal heat
source is governed by a diffusion equation,
the heat equation in polar coordinates, a
partial differential equation which is non-
homogeneous:
first discretize the domain in 49 nodes, 7
for each coordinate, and then write the
partial differential equation in a difference
form with Taylor series, taking the
subscripts i, j for the coordinates ,
respectively.

1 1 ,+1 ,1
= ( ) + 2 ( ) + (1) [
2
The problem has the following properties ,1 2, + ,+1
+ (8)
and boundary conditions respectively: 2
1, 2, + +1,
+ ]+ =0
= 1000 (2) 2 2
= 1 = 1 (3) And rearranging to ease the formulation of
the linear system
(0.5, ) = 100 ; 0 (4)
2
(1.5, ) ( ),1 ( + )2,
= [(1.5, ) 5] (5)
+ ( + ),+1
1 (, 0) (9)
= 60 ; 0.5 1.5 (6) + 1, + +1,

(, 1) =
1 = 0 ; 0 0.7 (7) Where

Where 1 is for the unshaded area and 2

is for the shaded area as can be seen in = ; = 2; = 2 2 (10)
2
figure 1.
And finally applying the boundary
We can see the mixed boundary conditions conditions the linear system can be solved.
present in the problem, Dirichlet (4),
The linear system is shown in the
Neumann (6,7) and Robin (5).
appendix.

The finite volume method discretizes the

4.Metodology continuous domain in control volumes as
The partial differential equation that
shown in figure 2, and integrates with
govern this present problem, with the
respect each independent variable the PDE
boundary conditions previously shown
in every control volume.
were solved numerically using two
methods, the finite volume method in the
open source program CONDUCT [2], and
the steady state with the finite difference
method, which was implemented by hand
and the system of linear equations was
solved using Mathcad, a calculation
software.
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With the results for the different grids in

CONDUCT the grid independence will be
analyzed, and compared with the MDF
results.

5. Computational
Implementation
As it was said the problem were solved
using the open source program
In (9) we have the 2D steady state
CONDUCT, and for the MDF calculations
diffusion equation. After the integration
it was used Mathcad. The post-processing
we have the balance of generation of the
of the data was realized in Tecplot and the
quantity and the fluxes through its cell
graphics were made in MATLAB.
faces (10). To reach an equation in terms
of we linear interpolate the gradients in The mesh used in the develop of the work
the faces and get (12). Rearranging its are the next:
equation, we have the general discretized
equation: CONDUCT MDF
7x7 7x7
12x12
22x22
In this case of heat diffusion we have that 40x40
Table 1. Numbers of control volumes.
= = .
The coefficients of the transport equation
This generate a system of equation which as next:
is solved by TDMA.

6.Results
First, the problem was solved with the
finite difference method in a 7x7 grid.
Then it was calculated in CONDUCT
using the grids shown in table 1 to see the
effect of the mesh resolution.

Figure 2. A part of the two-dimensional staggered

grid.
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Figure 3. Temperature profile () given by MDF Figure 4. Temperature profile () given by MDF

Figure 5. Temperature comparison for the same Figure 6. Temperature comparison for different
grid between CONDUCT and MDF grid between CONDUCT and MDF

Figure 7. Grid independence for CONDUCT

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7. Results Analysis and

Discussion
As can be seen in the MDF results in table
3 and 4 the solid is being cooled by
convection, and if the radius decreases a
maximum value of T is found in the zone
with internal heat generation and constant
heat flux.

The results given by the finite difference

method are validated with the results given
by CONDUCT, as it can be seen in figure
5 and 6, its mean that the method and the
boundary condition was well
implemented.

It was expected that the FVM was more

exactly that FDM for the same node
numbers, as it can be seen in figure 6 with
FDM we got a solution like a given by
FVM with more nodes.

In figure 7 can be seen the grid

independence, of which we can affirm that
a 12x12 grid is enough to solve this kind
of problems.

8.Conclusions
Finite difference method was successfully
implemented in this problem with mixed
boundary conditions.

For this kind of problems, a 12x12 grid is

enough.

9.Appendix
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9.1. System of linear equations

The linear system that was solved in the finite difference method is shown as follow.

Where:

1
= ; = ; = ; =
1 + 1 +

10.References
[1] Y. A. Engel y A. J. Ghajar, Transferencia de calor y masa: fundamentos y
aplicaciones. Mxico, D.F.: McGraw-Hill Interamericana, 2011.
[2] Suhas V. Patankar, Computation of Conduction and Duct Flow Heat Transfer. CRC
Press LLC, 1991.