Experimental study on heat transfer and rheological characteristics of hybrid nanofluids for cooling applications

The enhancement of heat transfer and rheological behaviour of hybrid nanofluids (HyNF) flowing through the tubular heat exchanger system were experimentally analysed. In this study, the effects of Nusselt number, Peclet number, Reynolds number, heat transfer coefficient and pressure drop were investigated for various volume concentrations of copper-titania hybrid nanocomposite (HyNC). The experiments were performed for various HyNC volume concentrations in the base fluid (cold water) ranging from 0.1% to 1.0%. The experimental results showed that the convective heat transfer coefficient of the HyNF increased by 59.3% for the particular volume concentration of 0.7% of HyNC. The friction factor and pressure drop of HyNF for 1.0% volume concentration were expected to be 0.8% and 5.4%, respectively. This implies for experiencing penalty in the pumping capacity. The experimental measurements, on the other hand, were validated using a newly developed correlation. For all the volume concentrations of HyNF, the deviation obtained for the experimental data and the prediction was observed to be +8% and -8%, respectively. The present correlation has been found to be in good agreement with the experimental data, which can be helpful in predicting the heat transfer characteristics of the HyNF.