The heat transfer surface can be effectively embedded in a packed bed to improve convective heat transfer. The enhanced heat transfer can be attributed to the combined action of the porous medium‘s increased fluid mixing (thermal dispersion) and decreased boundary layer thickness. As the title of the project suggests, in the present numerical validation study, we targeted validating a reference paper entitled “ Numerical studies of forced convection heat transfer from a cylinder embedded in a packed bed”.

Simulation Process

The cylinder embedded inside a packed bed is primarily designed using Design Modeler. The tactful division in this step facilitates the generation of a structured grid later inside ANSYS Meshing. In the present study, natural convection effects are expected to be negligible since the Rayleigh number based on the permeability and cylinder diameter is of the order of 0.05. The values employed for the effective Prandtl number of the glass-water-packed bed are 0.23. This is applied in terms of a Porous Medium in the solver.

Post-processing

The variation of Nusselt number over an embedded cylinder as a function of angular location is given in Figure 25 of the reference paper. It is evident that the Nusselt number experiences its highest peak in the forward stagnation point. It gradually decreases as the angular location moves toward the backward point. The parameter is reported in ANSYS Fluent, making a comparison, as shown below. Given the ambiguous parameters related to the porous zone, the coverage of two curves is completely acceptable. It proves a validation of the CFD numerical study