Experimental Steam Condensation Enhancement on Metal Foam Filled Heat Exchanger

A porous medium is a material consisting of a solid matrix including void spaces, either unconnected or connected. Pores may include a variety of fluids such as water. The open celled metal foam can be used in heat energy absorption, and flow diffusion. The high cost of the material generally limits its use to advanced technology and manufacturing. Metal foams are used in compact heat exchangers to increase heat transfer at the cost of reduced pressure. It is obvious that utilizing metal foam to enhance heat transfer characteristics of heat exchanger have great advances. Many researchers have examined these characteristics experimentally, numerically or both, by varying PPI, and porosity of different metal foams. The recent researches reveal no enough understanding of all aspects of experimental studies for the forced convection with phase change in horizontal copper tubes partially filled with metal foam and without metal foam (plain tube). Therefore, this experimental study presented to delve into the most important details that cause the apparent lack of understanding the process of the heat transfer through these types of applications. Consequently, the present work aimed to add further knowledge in this field, which is done through experimental investigation to check the effect of use of metal foam on the heat condensation. This was performed by manufacturing a heat exchanger filled with metal foam, using the copper alloy material. The study for the impact of the metallic foam on the convection and conduction heat transfer coefficients and condensation amount was carried out experimentally using a respective mechanical setting.