Improvement performance of the double-concentric pipes heat exchanger using

twisted tape insertions and nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32

Yosephus Ardean Kurnianto Prayitno, Ardi Wiranata, Muhammad Reza Pradecta, Muhammad Vega Adhi
Nugraha, and Suhanan

Citation: AIP Conference Proceedings 2001, 020011 (2018); doi: 10.1063/1.5049971

View online: https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5049971
View Table of Contents: http://aip.scitation.org/toc/apc/2001/1
Published by the American Institute of Physics
 Improvement Performance of The Double-Concentric Pipes
Heat Exchanger using Twisted Tape Insertions and
Nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32
Yosephus Ardean Kurnianto Prayitno1, 3, a), Ardi Wiranata2, 3, b), Muhammad Reza
Pradecta3, c), Muhammad Vega Adhi Nugraha2, d), and Suhanan2, 3, e)
1
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Vocational College, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Sekip Unit IV,
Caturtunggal, Depok, Sleman, Yogyakarta, 55281, Indonesia.
2
Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jalan
Grafika No.2, Bulaksumur, Sinduadi, Mlati, Sleman, Yogyakarta, 55281, Indonesia.
3
Center for Energy Studies, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Sekip K1-A, Bulaksumur, Yogyakarta, 55281, Indonesia.
a)
Corresponding author: yosephus.ardean@ugm.ac.id
b)
ardi.wiranata@ugm.ac.id
c)
reza.pradecta@gmail.com
d)
vegaadhi@gmail.com
e)
suhanan@ugm.ac.id

Abstract. The purpose of this study is to observe the effect on the performance of a double pipe-concentric heat exchanger
as the effect of the addition of twisted tape insertions and nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32 as the working fluid. Experiments
were carried out on a test rig that consists of two pipes with an inner pipe diameter of 38.1 mm for the inside pipe and inner
pipe diameter of 75.2 mm for the outside pipe. The working fluid, nanofluids, were constantly flowed and maintained at a
low temperature of 20°C. The flow rate was varied at 10 LPM; 12 LPM; 14 LPM; 16 LPM; 18 LPM; and 20 LPM. Twisted
tape insertions which are used in the experiment were made of Aluminum and have three variations of twist ratio which
are 7.35; 5.25; and 4.72. The nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32 has 3 volume fraction variations of 0% (base fluid); 0.1%; and
0.3%. The results showed that the addition of twisted tape insertions led to the increased heat transfer rate. This increment
was indicated by the increase of Nusselt number for each measurement planning. The increase of Reynolds number was
followed by the increase of heat transfer rate. Moreover, the increasing volume fraction of nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32
also influenced the performance of heat exchanger. The highest heat transfer rate was demonstrated by the highest Nusselt
number that observed on the twist ratio of 4.72 and Reynolds number of 20 LPM. On top of that, the volume fraction of
0.3% also produced the optimal Nusselt number. The experiments showed the best-operating conditions were found in the
specification of 0.3% nanofluids volume fraction with 4.72 twisted tape ratio.

INTRODUCTION

Heat Exchanger (HE) is equipment which is used to facilitate the heat transfer process between two or more working
fluids with a temperature difference. HE is necessary equipment for a system with the need of cooling or heating
process and is widely used in various industries such as petroleum, power plant, automotive, heavy duty equipment,
and petrochemical industry. In the household needs, HE could be used for various purposes such as water heater for
bath, refrigeration or indoor air heating, and refrigeration system [1]. The Performance of HE can be determined by
calculating the heat transfer rate which could be increased by various methods. These are categorized into three
methods: Active method, Passive method, and Combination method. The Active method requires external power input
such as surface vibration or fluid vibration to increase the value of heat transfer. The Passive method has been
identified by [2] in fourteen techniques, for example, using modifications on the surface and geometric shapes of heat

Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Thermofluids 2017 (THERMOFLUID 2017)

AIP Conf. Proc. 2001, 020011-1–020011-6; https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5049971
Published by AIP Publishing. 978-0-7354-1717-5/$30.00

020011-1
exchangers or swirl-flow devices by adding twisted tape inserts into a heat exchanger pipe [2]. This method is widely
used to increase the heat transfer rate because of its easiness and low cost regarding the implementation. One of the
most popular Passive methods is the addition of twisted insertions. The twisted tape insertions, which is inserted into
the heat exchanger pipe, is one of the methods that apply a swirl-flow generator on the flow inside the pipe. This
method can stimulate the flow to form a swirl flow inside the pipe and turn it into turbulence flow. It produces a fluid-
mixing effect which reduces the boundary thickness that would ultimately increase the heat transfer rate. This
phenomenon agrees with those described by [3]. The addition of twisted tape insertions inside the heat exchangers led
to the increase in the value of heat transfer, as the effect of the upward trend of tangential and radial flow turbulence
[3]. Furthermore, the enhancement of the working fluids of HE could improve the performance of the system. This
improvement could be achieved by using a working fluid which has high thermal conductivity. Nanofluids is a new
type of nanotechnology-based fluid that has superior thermos-physical properties compared to its base fluid [4]. One
of the developments of nanofluids was the study of the dissolved TiO2 in water, engine oil, and Ethylene Glycol (EG)
conducted by [5]. It resulted in the enhancement of thermal conductivity while applying the metallic nanoparticle
fluids. On the other study, the dissolved Copper (Cu) nanoparticles in EG had been succeeding to exhibit significantly
improved on thermal conductivity [6]. Recently, several studies have been carried out by [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12],
[13], [14], [15], [16] that experimentally investigate the heat transfer coefficients in pipes using nanotubes. The results
agreed that the heat transfer coefficient was increased when nanofluids was used as a working fluid compared with
the base fluid. The heat transfer rates were also increased as the growth of volume fraction of the nanotubes used. The
idea of adding metallic particles on the HE working fluid holds significant potential for the improvement of effective
thermal conductivity. For that reason, this present study aims to observe in both, the effect of twisted tape insertions
on the performance of a double pipe-concentric heat exchanger and the advantages of using nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT
32 as the HE working fluid.

RESEARCH METHOD
The experiments were carried out at the Heat and Mass Transfer Laboratory, Department of Mechanical and Industrial
Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia. The facility was previously used by [1],
[14], [15], and [16].

Experimental Setup

The experimental setup was a test rig that consists of double-concentric pipes heat exchanger with an inner pipe
diameter of 38.1 mm for the inside pipe and an inner pipe diameter of 75.2 mm for the outside pipe. Both pipes have
a length of 1.2 m and 1.5 m. The inside pipe was made of Copper (Cu), while the outside pipe was made of Stainless
Steel and coated with Asbestos to reduce the heat loss. Heat transfer was observed by using water as the hot fluid
which flows inside the outer pipe. On the other hand, nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32 was used as the working fluid for
a low temperature with variations in the volume fraction of TiO2 nanoparticles. In both reservoirs which are equipped
with chiller and heater, the nanofluids was maintained at a low temperature of 20°C, whereas the hot water was kept
at a high temperature of 60°C. Two pumping units were used to pump these into the test segment; they are Piusi
Viscomat F0033490A heavy-duty oil pump and Sanyo water pump. Moreover, the twisted tape insertions, which made
from Aluminum, varied into three variations which are 7.35; 5.25; and 4.72. Next, the working fluids used heat transfer
oil named TermoXT 32 as the base fluid and the nanoparticles of TiO2 with a particles size of 21 nm. Nanofluids is a
mixture of heat transfer oil and nanoparticles in a specific composition. In this experiment, the volume fraction
variations are 0% (base fluid), 0.1%, and 0.3%. The nanofluids was used as a coolant of the double-concentric pipes
heat exchanger. The cooling process was provided by a chiller that modified from an evaporator that connected into
an outdoor unit of air conditioner system. In term of measuring device, a volumetric flow meter that being used was
the Omega rotameter for the waters flow and Aichi digital flowmeter for nanofluids flow. The temperature was
measured by using K-type thermocouple system which was connected directly to the data logger. This measurement
applied ten thermocouples with an arrangement of two were mounted on the fluid flow inlet, two were mounted on
the flow outlet, and six were mounted along the inner test sections wall. Pressure drop was measured using a digital
pressure sensor. The schematic design of heat exchanger and the test rig can be seen in FIGURE 1.

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 FIGURE 1. Schematic Design and Test Rig.

Measurement of Heat Transfer using Nanofluids

The performance of HE was measured by the heat transfer rate as the effect of twisted tape and nanofluids
TiO2/TermoXT 32. It can be calculated by determining the desired values. First, the working fluid heat rate is
calculated by Eq. (1).

9
 6 <:9; 
$ =  :; (1)



where 9 is the mass flow rate of the working fluid,

$ is the specific heat of the working fluid, and  is the working
fluid’s temperature difference between inlet and outlet. Second, the mean heat flow rate (% ) between cold and hot
fluids can be calculated by determining the average value from each heat flow rate.

9 6 #  #   (2)

The overall coefficient of heat transfer in the annulus ( # ) is calculated by Eq. (2). where # is the surface area of the
outer wall of the inside pipe.  is the difference in logarithmic mean temperature. The working fluid’s heat
transfer coefficient in ( ! ) was determined by Eq. (3) derived from the overall thermal resistance equation consisting
of convection resistance inside annulus pipes, pipe walls resistance, and convection resistance inside of the inner pipe.
+
 2
 +  (3)
6 5 '"0 5
0 0 2 2

00 (4)
! 6 "

(/130. ) (5)

 6 &
Therefore, the Nusselt number and the Reynolds number can be determined by calculating the Eq. (4) and (5), where
υ represents the fluids velocity, and µ is the fluids dynamic viscosity. Last, the friction factor can be calculated by Eq.
(6), where ∆P represents the pressure drop, and L represents the length of the pipe on the test rig.

6 , 4-*
(6)
7 87 8
+0 *

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 RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Heat Transfer Measurements

The results are shown in FIGURE 2 give a different working fluids characteristic between base fluid and nanofluids.
The base fluid has a more extended range of heat transfer distribution for each increment of Reynold number but gives
no significant improvement in the heat transfer rate. On the other hand, due to the presence of dissolved nanoparticles
TiO2, the nanofluids provide a better heat transfer rate. It can be seen in FIGURE 2 for Nanofluids 0.3%, where the
heat transfer at the use of twist ratio 4.72 has a better trend than that observed in the base fluid. However, the slight
increase in volume fraction of nanofluids from 0.1% to 0.3% is not giving a significant enhancement of the heat
transfer rate. This rate is influenced by the value of thermal conductivity of the nanofluids. As the presence of
nanoparticles, the particle size of the dissolved nanoparticle has an essential contribution to the heat transfer rate. [7]
reported that the mean diameter of such particle used in the experiments affects the heat transfer rate result. In the
previous studies, [19] used 13 nm; [20] used 38 nm; and [7] used 28 nm, while the present study uses 21 nm. Despite
the fact that various tests have different size, it can be proposed that by decreasing the particle size, the effective
thermal conductivity of nanofluids would be increased which also leads to the importance of the nanofluids
contribution in enhancing the heat transfer rate.

FIGURE 2. Heat transfer distribution as a function of volume fraction of nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32 in various
velocity for all variations

As the presence of the dissolved nanoparticles on the nanofluids would increase the viscosity of the working fluids,
friction factors that measured inside the pipe gave an upward trend due to the presence of twisted tape insertions.
These twist tapes have significant input for the heat transfer rate, in term of friction factor, FIGURE 3 shows the
observed circumstances during the study. It can be seen that the higher volume fraction of nanofluids (0.3%) give the
highest friction factor. Twist ratio of 4.72 was also given a higher friction factor as the result of the higher viscosity
of the nanofluids 0.3% that flow inside the pipe through a tight obstacle as the presence of twisted tape insertions with
twist ratio 4.72. It indicates the potential disadvantages on the using of nanofluids and twisted tape insertions in

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unsuitable specifications. Therefore, the best operation conditions as the optimal arrangement of the double-concentric
pipe heat exchanger system are needed. It could be done by measuring the heat exchanger performances.

FIGURE 3. Friction factor distribution as a function of volume fraction of nanofluids TiO2/TermoXT 32 in

various velocity for all variations

FIGURE 4. Heat exchanger performances as a function of Nusselt number and twist ratio in various velocity for
Nanofluids 0.3%

Heat Exchanger Performances

The performances of heat exchanger were determined by measuring the heat transfer rate by Nusselt number. The
variations in the volume fraction of nanofluids and the twist ratio of twisted tape insertions would be the function of
heat exchanger performances. It is clear that Nanofluids 0.3% gave the best operation condition. FIGURE 4 shows
that a significant increase obtained at twist ratio 4.734 for each velocity regarding Reynolds Number (Re). On the
other way, both twist ratio of 7.349 and 5.249 only gave lean enhancement of the heat transfer rate. On the top of that,
those standards almost similar to the base fluid (nanofluids with 0% of nanoparticles TiO2) at the highest velocity.
The most elevated heat transfer rate was measured on Nusselt number=128.03 and at Reynolds number=198.05.
Hence, by implementing this twisted tape and Nanofluids as working fluids, the improvement of HE performances
reached 8% at Reynolds number of 198.05 compared to the Base Fluids (Heat transfer oil TermoXT 32).

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 CONCLUSIONS
The improved performance of the double-concentric pipes heat exchanger using twisted tape insertions and nanofluids
TiO2/TermoXT 32 are successfully measured. The experimental results show that the heat transfer rate concerning the
Nusselt number of nanofluids with various volume fraction increases relative to those of the base fluids. A comparison
between the present study and the previous work shows a possible relation between the nanoparticle size that affects
on the heat transfer rate. The nanoparticle size on the present study, 21 nm, was compared by the other size reported
by the study of [7] where leads to a suggestion that the heat transfer rate of nanofluids also depends on the size of the
dissolved nanoparticles. However, the increased viscosity of nanofluids is affecting the friction factor inside the pipe.
The lowest twist ratio, 4.724, give the best performance of heat exchanger with the highest Nusselt number on highest
velocity regarding Reynold number. In order to obtain the best possible specification of twisted tape insertions using
nanofluids on the heat exchanger, a further study is needed. The higher friction factor appeared on the best
experimental condition which is at Nanofluids 0.3% on twist ratio 4.72. Moreover, to produce a significant
enhancement of heat transfer rate, more studies on the best range volume fractions of nanofluids and the suitable
characteristic of twist ratio are needed.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This present work was carried out within a research project funded by Research Funding 2017 from Vocational
College, Universitas Gadjah Mada and by Nanofluids Research Group Funding, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas
Gadjah Mada. The authors would like to express their sincere appreciation for technical support from Sasmono, M.
Arif. M, and Risdian P.

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