Mean flow behaviour and resulting thermo-hydraulics of inclined louvered fins

Inclined louvered fins are a hybrid fin design aimed at improved performance at low Reynolds numbers for finand-tube heat exchangers. In this research, the coupling between the mean flow behaviour and the resulting thermohydraulics is studied. A combination of flow visualisation (dye injection) and numerical simulation was used to determine the mean flow angle and to study the transition to unsteady flow. Scaled models were tested in a wind tunnel to determine the thermo-hydraulic characteristics. It was found that a strong coupling exists between the flow behaviour (boundary layer driven flow) and the thermohydraulics.