Numerical Study of Heat Transfer in Rectangular Fins for Different Cases of Thermo-Physical Properties

Abstract

The present work is a contribution to the development of a calculation code that determines the temperature field on fins having rectangular geometry for any bi-dimensional or three-dimensional simulation conditions. Different cases of simulations are presented. An implicit finite volume method, unconditionally stable, is extended in this study for the discretization of the governing equations. The representative results, validated by the Ansys code, show that the fin temperature increases with the increase of the temperature values selected as the boundary conditions, with the addition of a heat flow or any additional heat source. The numerical results are very consistent with the theory and the results obtained from commercialized codes. By increasing the diffusivity one converge more quickly towards the stationary solution. Upon reducing the fin size a very drastic shift occurs from the transient regime to a permanent one. In the case of a refinement of the mesh, the use of a very small epsilon ensures the convergence. Therefore, the results obtained in this study serve as basis of comparison with any other study on heat transfer on rectangular fins.