Abstract

Present research work is based on the application of different nanofluids and basefluids in an heat exchanger, for the purpose of investigating the best combinations for the application. During the research work, dimensions of a standard shell and heat exchanger were adopted from a customized machine manufacturing firm, and with the help simulation approach, maximum heat flux, enthalpy drop at exit and exit temperature were calculated for different combinations of basefluids and nanofluids, as well as basefluids. For this purpose, ANSYS 2021 R1 software was used, and conjugate heat transfer approach with k-epsilon model was adopted. In order to get a unique result, a statistical technique, relative standard deviation, was also used. The basefluids used were, water and ethylene glycol, whereas the nanofluids used were Al, Al₂O₃, Cu, CuO, MgO, MWCNT, NiO, SiO₂, TiO₂. The results of the research work showed that the combination H₂O-NiO showed the best performance, and H₂O was considered as the best basefluid.

Keywords: Nanofluids, basefluids, ANSYS 2021 R1, heat transfer, k-epsilon model, heat exchanger.