Analysis of heat transfer enhancement in microchannel by varying the height of pin fins at upstream and downstream region

Abstract

In this study, a numerical analysis of a microchannel with the different configuration of varying height of pin fins entrenched at the bottom of the channel base wall has been carried out. Five different configurations of pin fins arrangement which are considered in this study are, Case 1(Full length fins in complete microchannel), Case 2(Full length fins at the upstream), Case 3(Full length fins at the downstream), Case 4(Full length fin at the center of microchannel), Case 5(Full length fins at the inlet and exit of microchannel) and the results of these five cases are compared with the plain rectangular microchannel. In this investigation, deionized ultra-filtered water is used and Reynold’s number is ranging from 150 to 350. Results reveals that the highest Nusselt number is achieved by case 2 at a lesser value of Reynold’s number while by case 5 at higher Reynold’s number and the lowest pressure drop is occurring in case 4. The overall thermal performance of case 2 beats the corresponding cases.