HYDRODYNAMIC AND THERMAL CHARACTERISTICS OF CORRUGATED CHANNELS: EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH

Corrugated channels in a plate heat exchanger have probably the most complicated geometry of all flow ducts. To understand the hydrodynamic and thermal characteristics of corrugated channels, aproper balance of theoretical, computational, and experimental approaches is essential. The theoretical approach, which involves the simultaneous solution of the governing equations of fluid dynamics, becomes so complex as to be impractical, except for some special cases and with many simplifying assumptions. The computational approach includes using computers to solve discretized versions of the governing equations of fluid dynamics. This article is focused on an experimental approach which concerns local pressure and local temperature measurements.