Enhancement of Convection Heat Transfer in Air Using Ultrasound

Abstract

The use of ultrasound is a new method to enhance convection drying. However, there is little information in the literature on the improvement of convective heat transfer caused by ultrasound. Therefore, the heat transport during ultrasound-assisted convective heating of small samples in a hybrid dryer was experimentally examined. A small Biot number regime of heat transfer was considered. The results confirmed a great enhancement of heat transfer due to the application of ultrasound. Due to the use of ultrasound, the convective heat exchange coefficient increased from 45% to almost 250%. The enhancement is a linear function of applied ultrasound power. It was shown that the energy absorption of ultrasound existed, but the thermal effect of this absorption was very small.