A Numerical Study on Swirling Hot Air Anti-Icing with Various Surface Structures on the Internal Wall

Abstract

Swirling hot air is a promising heat transfer enhancement technology for anti-icing applications in aircrafts, where the swirling flow is accompanied by pretty high turbulence and a quite thin boundary layer. It is of interest to investigate the compound heat transfer characteristics of the swirling air configuration combined with surface structures on the internal wall. This paper carries out a series of numerical computations to obtain the Nusselt number and pressure loss data in such a swirling air heat transfer system with four kinds of surface structures (trenches, ribs, dimples and bulges) on the wall and with different tangential inlet jets placed along the tube. At a tube Reynolds number from 10,000 to 50,000, the results show that the surface dimples and bulges are conducive to improving the Nusselt number, but the surface trenches and ribs show a Nusselt number deterioration relative to the smooth swirl tube. Among the four investigated surface structures, the surface bulges perform best, which can enhance the Nusselt number by up to 15.0%, increase the total heat transfer quantity by up to 17.3% and reduce the hot air pressure loss by up to 15.6%. Furthermore, the circumferential velocity distribution and swirl number are introduced to describe the flow fields. The surface trenches and ribs lead to less of a reduction in the circumferential velocity and swirl intensity, while the surface dimples and bulges could significantly suppress the in-tube swirl intensity.