Chapter 8:

Internal Flow
 Hydrodynamic Considerations
• Boundary layer develops with increasing x and merges at the
centerline.
• Viscous effects extend over the entire cross section and the velocity
profile no longer changes with increasing x. The flow is then said to
be fully developed.
• The distance from the entrance at which this condition is achieved
is termed the hydrodynamic entry length, xfd,h

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• The fully developed velocity profile is parabolic for laminar flow in
a circular tube.
• For turbulent flow, the profile is flatter due to turbulent mixing in
the radial direction.
• The Reynolds number for flow in a circular tube is defined as:

• In a fully developed flow, the critical Reynolds number

corresponding to the onset of turbulence is ReD,c ≈ 2300.

• The hydrodynamic entry length:

- For laminar flow (ReD ≤ 2300)

- For turbulent flow

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The Mean Velocity

• The mass flow rate through the tube is defined as:

um is the mean velocity
ρ the fluid density
Ac is the cross-sectional area of the tube and is equal to π D2/4

• The mass flow rate may also be expressed:

• For incompressible flow in a circular tube:

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Velocity Profile in the Fully Developed Region
• Laminar flow, incompressible, constant property fluid in the fully
developed region of a circular tube.
• An important feature of hydrodynamic conditions in the fully
developed region:

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Velocity Profile in the Fully Developed Region (continued)

Using Newton’s law of viscosity:

Solving using boundary conditions: and

the fully developed velocity

profile is parabolic!

Substituting into the mean velocity equation and integrating:

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Pressure Gradient and Friction Factor in Fully Developed Flow
• Moody (or Darcy) friction factor is a dimensionless parameter
defined as:

• The friction coefficient (Fanning friction factor) is defined as:

• Evaluating from the velocity profile obtained

earlier, it follows:

• For a fully developed laminar flow:

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Pressure Gradient and Friction Factor in Fully Developed Flow
• For fully developed turbulent flow, the analysis is more
complicated, and we must ultimately rely on experimental results.
The friction factor is also a function of the tube surface condition
and increases with surface roughness e.

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 Thermal Considerations
• A fluid enters at the a uniform temperature T(r, 0). Convection heat
transfer occurs and a thermal boundary layer begins to develop.
• A thermally fully developed condition is eventually reached.
• The shape of the fully developed temperature profile T(r, x)
depends of the surface boundary conditions.

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• For laminar flow the thermal entry length may be expressed as

• If Pr > 1, the hydrodynamic boundary layer develops more rapidly

than the thermal boundary layer (xfd,h < xfd,t)

• The inverse is true for Pr < 1

• For turbulent flow, conditions are nearly independent of Prandtl

number, and to a first approximation, we shall assume (xfd,t/D) = 10

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The Mean Temperature
• The absence of a fixed free stream temperature necessitates using a
mean (or bulk) temperature.
• In the equation below, it was implicitly assumed that the
temperature was uniform across the inlet and outlet cross-sectional
areas

• The mean temperature is defined so that the term 𝑚cpTm is equal to

the true rate of thermal energy (or enthalpy) advection integrated
over the cross section.

• For flow in a circular tube with constant ρ and cp

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Thermally Fully Developed Conditions
• The existence of convection heat transfer between the surface and
the fluid dictates that the fluid temperature must continue to change
with x.
• The situation is certainly different from the hydrodynamic case, for
which (𝜕u/𝜕x) = 0 in the fully developed region.
• If there is heat transfer, (dTm/dx), as well as (𝜕T/𝜕x) at any radius r,
is not zero!!!
• A thermally fully developed condition is reached when the
following condition is met:

• This implies that although the temperature profile T(r) continues to

change with x, the relative shape of the profile no longer changes.
• The condition given above is eventually reached in a tube for which
there is either a uniform surface heat flux or a uniform surface
temperature.
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Thermally Fully Developed Conditions (continued)
• For a thermally fully developed flow

• Substituting 𝜕T/𝜕r from Fourier’s law

and using Newton’s law of cooling

• Hence in the thermally fully developed flow of a fluid with constant

properties, the local convection coefficient is a constant,
independent of x!!!
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Thermally Fully Developed Conditions (continued)

In the thermally fully

developed flow of a fluid with
constant properties, the local
convection coefficient is a
constant.

Axial variation of the convection heat transfer

coefficient for flow in a tube.
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Thermally Fully Developed Conditions (continued)
• For a thermally fully developed flow with uniform surface heat flux,
both h and the surface heat flux are constant.
Using Newton’s law of cooling

• Expanding the equation below for a thermally fully developed flow

Therefore, the axial temperature

gradient is independent of the radial
location.
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Thermally Fully Developed Conditions (continued)
• For a thermally fully developed flow with constant surface
temperature, (dTs /dx = 0),
• Once more, expanding the equation below for a thermally fully
developed flow

and applying the condition above:

in which case the value of

𝜕T/𝜕x depends on the radial
coordinate.
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 The Energy Balance
• Because the flow in a tube is completely enclosed, an energy
balance may be applied to determine how the mean temperature
Tm(x) varies with position along the tube and how the total
convection heat transfer qconv is related to the difference in
temperatures at the tube inlet and outlet.

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The Energy Balance (continued)
• Fluid moves at a constant flow rate 𝑚 and convection heat transfer
occurs at the inner surface. Typically, it will be reasonable to make
one of the four assumptions (see chapter 1) that leads to the
simplified steady-flow thermal energy equation:

• It is a general expression that applies irrespective of the nature of

the surface thermal or tube flow conditions

Tm must always vary with x

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The Energy Balance (continued)
Constant surface heat flux

• Integrating from x = 0, it follows that:

• The mean temperature varies linearly

with x along the tube
• (Ts - Tm) must also be independent
of x in the fully developed region
• The total heat rate may be obtained
from

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The Energy Balance (continued)
Constant surface temperature
• Defining ∆T = Ts – Tm

• Had we integrated from the inlet of the tube to some axial position x
within the tube, we would have obtained similar, but more general
form of this equation:

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The Energy Balance (continued)
Constant surface temperature

• From the expression in the previous slide, the temperature

difference (Ts – Tm) decays exponentially with distance along the
tube axis.

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The Energy Balance (continued)
Constant surface temperature
• Determination of an expression for the total heat transfer rate
qconv is complicated by the exponential nature of the temperature
decay.

• Using

Where ∆Tlm is the log mean temperature difference

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The Energy Balance (continued)
• Sometimes, the temperature of an external fluid, rather than the
tube surface temperature, that is fixed.

• The results derived above may still be

used if Ts is replaced by T∞ (the free
stream temperature of the external
fluid) and is ℎ is replaced by 𝑈 (the
average overall heat transfer coefficient)

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 Laminar Flow in Circular Tubes:
Thermal Analysis
• The problem of heat transfer in laminar flow of an incompressible,
constant property fluid in the fully developed region of a circular
tube can be solved analytically.

• For a circular tube characterized by uniform surface heat flux, the

Nusselt number is a constant, independent of ReD, Pr, and axial
location.

• For a constant surface temperature, the resulting Nusselt number is:

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The Entry Region
• The results of the preceding section are valid only when both the
velocity and temperature profiles are fully developed.
• If either or both profiles are not fully developed, the flow is said to
be in the entry region.
• Two different entry length solutions have been obtained:
a). The simplest solution is for the thermal entry length problem,
and it is based on assuming that thermal conditions develop in the
presence of a fully developed velocity profile (ex: presence of an
unheated starting length, or large Prandtl number fluids).
b). The combined entry length problem corresponds to the case for
which the temperature and velocity profiles develop
simultaneously.
• It would never be the case that thermal conditions are fully
developed and hydrodynamic conditions are developing.

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The Entry Region (continued)
• Nusselt numbers NuD are, in principle, infinite at x = 0 and decay to
their asymptotic (fully developed) values with increasing x.

• Graetz number:

• For the thermal entry problem, the manner in which NuD varies
with 1/GzD is independent of Pr.

• For the combined entry length case, heat transfer (therefore NuD)
results depend on the Prandtl number.

• At any location within the entry region, NuD decreases with

increasing Pr and approaches the thermal entry length condition as
Pr → ∞.
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The Entry Region (continued)
The plot below shows local Nusselt number from the entry length
solutions for laminar flow in a circular tube.

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The Entry Region (continued)
• For the thermal entry length problem, [Hausen] presented a
correlation:

• All properties appearing in the correlation above should be

evaluated at the average mean temperature 𝑇m = (Tm,i + Tm,o) / 2

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The Entry Region (continued)
• For the combined entry problem, the Nusselt number depends on
the Prandtl and Graetz numbers. [Baehr and Stephan] recommended
a correlation of the form:

• All properties appearing in the correlation above should be

evaluated at the average mean temperature 𝑇m = (Tm,i + Tm,o) / 2

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Convection Correlations: Turbulent Flow in Circular Tubes
• For fully developed (hydrodynamically and thermally) turbulent
flow in a smooth circular tube, the local Nusselt number may be
obtained from the Dittus–Boelter equation

where n = 0.4 for heating (Ts > Tm) and 0.3 for cooling (Ts < Tm)

The equations may be used for small to moderate temperature

differences, Ts - Tm) , with all properties evaluated at Tm
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Convection Correlations: Turbulent Flow in Circular Tubes
• For flows characterized by large property variations, [Sieder and
Tate] proposed the following equation:

where all properties except μs are evaluated at Tm

To a good approximation, the foregoing correlations may be

applied for both the uniform surface temperature and heat flux
conditions.
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Noncircular Tubes
• Many engineering applications involve convection transport in
noncircular tubes.

• Many of the circular tube results may be applied by using an

effective diameter as the characteristic length.

• It is termed the hydraulic diameter and is defined as:

where Ac and P are the flow cross-sectional area and the wetted
perimeter, respectively.

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