Flow efficiency in mulli-louvered fins

The paper studies the effect of Reynolds number, fin pitch, louver thickness, and louver angle on flow efficiency in multi-louvered fins. Results show that flow efficiency is strongly dependent on geometrical parameters, especially at low Reynolds numbers. Flow efficiency increases with Reynolds number and louver angle, while decreasing with fin pitch and thickness ratio. A characteristic flow efficiency length scale ratio is identified based on geometrical and first-order hydrodynamic effects, which together with numerical results is used to develop a general correlation for flow efficiency. Comparisons show that the correlation represents more than 95% of numerical predictions within a 10% error band, and 80% of predictions within a 5% error band over a wide range of geometrical and hydrodynamic conditions. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.