Title: Flow and heat transfer in pipe caused by localised cold spot

Authors: Uduak Mme, Stein Tore Johansen, Sabita Sarkar, Randi Moe, Alexandre Goldszal, Yves Ladam

Addresses: Department of Petroleum Engineering and Applied Geophysics, NTNU, Trondheim, Norway. ' SINTEF Materials and Chemistry, Trondheim, Norway. ' SINTEF Materials and Chemistry, Trondheim, Norway; Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, India. ' FMC Kongsberg Subsea AS, Asker, Norway. ' TOTAL E&P NORGE AS, Stavanger, Norway. ' SINTEF Energy Research AS, Trondheim, Norway

Abstract: Heat losses caused by cold spots and natural convection flow is important in many industrial applications. In this paper we present both experimental work and modelling work. Experimentally, the cool-down in an instrumented pipe is investigated for different pipe inclinations. The experimental temperature field is discussed and interpreted by means of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). For prediction of the evolvement of the local temperature and heat flow, selection of an appropriate turbulence model is critical. The predicted temperature profiles and heat extraction rates are compared with the experiments for selected turbulence models. Finally, industrial implications of the findings are discussed.

Keywords: natural convection; pipe inclination; gravity; localised cold spots; CFD; computational fluid dynamics; heat transfer; pipes; modelling; turbulence modelling.

DOI: 10.1504/PCFD.2009.027372

Progress in Computational Fluid Dynamics, An International Journal, 2009 Vol.9 No.6/7, pp.409 - 416

Published online: 21 Jul 2009 *

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