MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

ME312 - Thermal Engineering

Experiment - 1

Natural Convective Heat Transfer Rate From Horizontal Cylinders

Report

Group - 6

18.04.2022

Serhat Serdar Seyfi Mehmet Furkan

Çelik Dilmen Doğan
2377760 2377950 2377976
1. Introduction

In this experiment, our objective is to find out the rate of convective heat transfer of
the heated cylinders. And in order to achieve the result, we are expected to use the data that
we collect in the laboratory, then, by following the required calculations, we have to reach the
convective heat transfer rate step-by-step.

First step is to calculate the heat which is transferred with the help of the circuit. We
have the values of voltage and the current to calculate power delivered into the cylinders.
Then what we have to do is separate the rate of heat transfers according to the cross-sectional
areas to obtain individual results. And next step is, to determine Rayleigh and Nusselt
numbers for properties of the certain temperature which is the mean temperature of cylinders’
surfaces and ambient. And finally we can use the values that we obtain to create a plot for the
relation between Nusselt and Rayleigh numbers.

All the calculations we did, the table of dataset and results, and the plot are placed
below the related headlines.
2. Sample Calculations

D12 ≔ 20 mm D34 ≔ 30 mm D56 ≔ 40 mm L ≔ 300 mm

D12i ≔ 15 mm D34i ≔ 26.1 mm D56i ≔ 37.2 mm

⎛D - D 2 ⎞
2
D34 2 - D34i 2 D56 2 - D56i 2
⎝ 12 12i ⎠
Ac12 ≔ π ⋅ ――――― Ac34 ≔ π ⋅ ―――― Ac56 ≔ π ⋅ ――――
4 4 4
A1 ≔ π ⋅ D12 ⋅ L = 0.0188 m 2

Total heat tranfer rate from 1st, 3rd and 5th cylinders are V*I. We can find individual heat
transfer rates by rating them according to their electrical resistances, which is dependening
on crossectional areas.
Ac12
Q1 ≔ 19.8 V ⋅ 0.76 A ⋅ ―――――― = 4.317 W
Ac12 + Ac34 + Ac56

Q1 W
q'' ≔ ―― = 229.045 ――
A1 m2

⎛ 2.22 + 2.20 + 2.13 ⎞

Tamb ≔ 26 °C Tw ≔ ⎜23.46 ⋅ ―――――― + 2.35⎟ °C = 53.571 °C
⎝ 3 ⎠
-8 W
ε ≔ 0.031 σ ≔ 5.670 ⋅ 10 ―――
m2 ⋅ K4

W
q''r ≔ ε ⋅ σ ⋅ ⎛⎝Tw 4 - Tamb 4 ⎞⎠ = 5.952 ――
m2

W q''c W
q''c ≔ q'' - q''r = 223.093 ―― hexp ≔ ―――― = 8.092 ―――
m2 Tw - Tamb m2 ⋅ K

Tw + Tamb
Tf ≔ ―――― = 39.7855 °C
2
Properties of air @ Tf = 39.7855 °C & p ≔ 1 atm = 101.325 kPa from irc.wisc.edu/properties/
1 kg W
β ≔ 0.0032 ⋅ ― μ ≔ 19.2 10 -6 Pa ⋅ s ρ ≔ 1.13 ―― k ≔ 0.0271 ――
K m3 m⋅K
2 2
J μ m k m
cp ≔ 1010 ―― ν ≔ ―= ⎛⎝1.699 ⋅ 10 -5⎞⎠ ――α ≔ ―― = ⎛⎝2.374 ⋅ 10 -5⎞⎠ ――Pr ≔ 0.713
kg ⋅ K ρ s ρ ⋅ cp s

g ⋅ β ⋅ D12 3 ⋅ ⎛⎝Tw - Tamb⎞⎠

Ra ≔ ―――――――― = 17156.192
ν⋅α From equation (2):
2
hexp ⋅ D12 ⎛ ―
1 ⎞
Nuexp ≔ ―――= 5.9717 ⎜ 6 ⎟
k 0.387 ⋅ Ra
Nu2 ≔ ⎜0.60 + ―――――― 8
⎟ = 4.982
From equation (1): ⎜ ――
27
⎟
⎜ ⎛ 9 ⎞ ⎟
――
⎜ ⎜ ⎛ 0.559 ⎞ 16 ⎟ ⎟
Nu1 ≔ 0.48 ⋅ Ra 0.25 = 5.493 ⎜ ⎜1 + ⎜――⎟ ⎟ ⎟
⎜⎝ ⎝ ⎝ Pr ⎠ ⎠ ⎟⎠
 3. Results

Table 1 - Experiment Results

# 𝐴(𝑚2) 𝑄0(W) 2
𝑞''0(𝑊/𝑚 )
◦
𝑇𝑤( 𝐶)
2 2
𝑞''𝑟(𝑊/𝑚 ) 𝑞''𝑐(𝑊/𝑚 ) ℎ𝑒𝑥𝑝(𝑊/𝑚 𝐾)
2 Ra Nu

1 0.0188 4.3174 229.0453 53.5710 5.9524 223.0929 8.0916 1.7156e+4 5.9716

2 0.0188 9.2356 489.9634 82.1922 13.9483 476.0151 8.4712 2.8420e+4 6.0293

3 0.0283 5.3977 190.9060 46.2202 4.2097 186.6963 9.2332 4.4549e+4 10.2972

4 0.0283 11.5466 408.3775 71.6352 10.7633 397.6142 8.7129 8.4589e+4 9.4363

5 0.0377 5.3329 141.4584 41.6064 3.1757 138.2828 8.8606 8.4780e+4 13.2744

6 0.0377 11.4078 302.6014 58.9668 7.3087 295.2927 8.9573 1.5821e+5 13.1242

figure 1. Rayleigh vs. Nusselt numbers

4. Discussion

We were expecting results to match equation 1 and equation 2 better. However,

experimental results happen to be more than the equations suggest. This may be a result of
the fact that there is not only natural convection and radiation, but also forced convection due
to the flows in the room. Those flows may be created by the movements of the people.

Moreover, results vary from the fitted curve. This is because experimental error is
large for some reason. That is a result of uncontrollability of the external factors such as
variations in temperatures, and flows around the cylinders.

5. Conclusion

To conclude the experiment, what we are expected to find seems to be simple,

because the steps, calculations and the relations are very clear to follow. Although we had
some disturbances due to the external factors and errors, the results are relevant with the
experiment and the other values. Therefore, regardless of the disturbances we had the chance
of observing the effects of different conditions to the heat transfer rate, to Rayleigh number
and to Nusselt number.

6. References

[1] https://irc.wisc.edu/properties/
APPENDIX - 1 DATA
APPENDIX - 2

MATLAB Code Used for Calculations

%% ME312 Thermal Engineering
% Experiment 1
% Natural Convective Heat Transfer Rate from Horizontal Cylinders
% Group 6
clc;clear;close all;
%% Data
% Importing Data
opts = detectImportOptions('data.csv');
opts.SelectedVariableNames = 2;
Data = readmatrix('data.csv',opts);
clear opts;
T = Data(1:18); % mV
Tamb = Data(19); % C degree
V = [Data(20) Data(22)]; % V
I = [Data(21) Data(23)]; % A
% Given Values and Constants
L = 0.3; % m
D = [20e-3 20e-3 30e-3 30e-3 40e-3 40e-3]; % m
Di = [15e-3 15e-3 26.1e-3 26.1e-3 37.2e-3 37.2e-3]; % m
eps = 0.031; % Emissivity of the cylinders
sigma = 5.670374419e-8; % W/m^2*K Stefan-Boltzmann Constant
g = 9.80665; % m/s^2 Gravitational acceleration
% Importing Properties
prop = readtable('properties.csv','VariableNamingRule','preserve');
beta = prop.beta'; % 1/K
k = prop.k'; % W/m*K
nu = (prop.mu ./ prop.rho)'; % m^2/s
alpha = (prop.k ./ (prop.rho .* prop.cp))'; % m^2/s
%% Calculations
% Heat Transfer Area of the Cylinders
A = pi.*D.*L; % m^2
% Crosssectional Area of the Cylinders
Ac = (pi.*(D.^2 - Di.^2))./4;
% Rate of Heat Transfer Through the Cylinders
for i=[1 3 5] Q(i) = V(1)*I(1).*(Ac(i))./(Ac(1)+Ac(3)+Ac(5));end % W
for i=[2 4 6] Q(i) = V(2)*I(2).*(Ac(i))./(Ac(2)+Ac(4)+Ac(6));end % W
% Rate of Heat Transfer per Unit Area
q = (Q)./A; % W/m^2
% Surface Temperatures of the Cylinders
T = double(23.46*T + 2.35); % C degree
for i=1:6 Tw(i) = mean(T((i-1)*3+1:(i-1)*3+3));end % C degree
% Radiation Heat Transfer Rate per Unit Area
qr = eps*sigma.*((Tw+273.15).^4-(Tamb+273.15)^4); % W/m^2
% Convective Heat Transfer Rate per Unita Area
qc = q - qr; % W/m^2
hexp = qc./(Tw-Tamb); % W/m^2*K
% Calculating Film Temperature
Tf = (Tw + Tamb)./2; % C degree
% Calculating Rayleigh Number
Ra = g .* beta .* D.^3 .* (Tw - Tamb) ./ (nu .* alpha);
% Calculating Nusselt Number
Nu = hexp .* D ./ k;
%% Plotting
scatter(Ra,Nu,'+','LineWidth',1.5);
grid on;
hold on;
syms x;
% Fit Using Curve Fitting Tool
p1 = -4.803e-10;
p2 = 0.000135;
p3 = 3.686;
f(x) = p1*x^2 + p2*x + p3;
fplot(f,[0 16e4],'b-.','LineWidth',1);
% Equation 1
y1(x) = 0.48 * x^0.25;
fplot(y1,[0 16e4],'LineWidth',1.5);
% Equation 2
Pr = 0.713;
y2(x) = (0.60+(0.387*x^(1/6))./(1+(0.559/Pr)^(9/16))^(8/27))^2;
fplot(y2,[0 16e4],'LineWidth',1.5);
% Labels
legend('data','fitted curve','eqn1','eqn2','location','northwest');
xlabel('Ra');ylabel('Nu');