Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer Enhancement in Shell and Tube Heat Exchangers

Abstract

Shell-and-tube heat exchangers (STHEs) are widely used because they tolerate high pressure, offer large heat-transfer area, and can be maintained with established industrial practices. Their thermal performance, however, is strongly influenced by shell-side bypassing, dead zones, baffle geometry, flow rate, and pressure-drop limitations. This methodology paper develops an experimentally implementable procedure for quantifying heat-transfer enhancement in a laboratory STHE by comparing a conventional segmental-baffle arrangement with an enhanced helical-baffle arrangement under matched inlet temperatures and flow conditions. Hot water is circulated through the shell and cold water through the tube bundle in counter-flow operation. Inlet/outlet temperatures, volumetric or mass flow rates, and shell-side pressure drop are measured after steady state is achieved. Heat duty, logarithmic mean temperature difference (LMTD), overall heat-transfer coefficient, effectiveness, Reynolds number, and a thermo-hydraulic performance index are calculated from the measurements. Uncertainty propagation and an energy-balance acceptance criterion are included to strengthen reproducibility. Prior experimental studies demonstrate that baffle configuration and nanofluid use can increase heat-transfer performance, but the gain must be evaluated together with pumping penalty [1–12]. The proposed method isolates the effect of baffle-induced flow redistribution and provides a repeatable framework for evaluating enhancement without falsely treating literature trends as new measurements. An illustrative results table is included only to demonstrate the analysis and reporting procedure and must be replaced by actual laboratory readings in a final experimental article.