Numerical investigation of boiling heat transfer on the shell-side of spiral wound heat exchanger

The aim of this paper is to numerically study boiling heat transfer on the shell-side of spiral wound heat exchanger (SWHE). The physical model for the shell-side of SWHE is established and the volume of fluid (VOF) method is used in the calculation. For propane and ethane, there are thirty cases to be simulated . Through the comparison with experimental data, the cause which leads to the simulation distortion is found, and the satisfied results of calculation are finally achieved. The simulation results show that the VOF model can be adopted well to those calculations whose inlet quality are lower than 0.1 kg/kg, and the calculation deviations are generally within ±20 %. In falling film flow, the heat transfer performance for the shell-side of SWHE is primarily influenced by Reynolds number. The visualization of simulation results displays that the boiling bubbles have three flow directions, besides flowing down with liquid phase, one portion of bubbles flows reversely up, and another portion is blocked at axial gaps of coils where the heat transfer is reduced. The studies of boiling on the shell-side of SWHE not only reveal the characteristics of heat transfer, but also point out the improvement direction of SWHE.