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

Abstract

Shell-and-tube heat exchangers are widely used because of their mechanical robustness and ability to operate over broad temperature and pressure ranges; however, conventional segmental-baffle designs can exhibit recirculation zones, bypass flow and comparatively high shell-side pressure loss. This methodology paper proposes a controlled water-to-water experiment for quantifying heat-transfer enhancement obtained by replacing conventional single-segmental baffles with a 30° discontinuous helical-baffle arrangement while keeping the shell, tube bundle and heat-transfer area unchanged. The planned measurements include inlet and outlet temperatures, shell- and tube-side flow rates, and shell-side differential pressure at steady state. Heat duty is obtained from the hot- and cold-fluid energy balances, while logarithmic mean temperature difference, overall heat-transfer coefficient, Reynolds number, Nusselt number, exchanger effectiveness and a thermo-hydraulic performance index are used for comparison. The proposed design uses repeated runs over four shell-side flow rates and three tube-side flow rates to establish repeatability and to separate heat-transfer gains from pumping penalties. A representative analysis, included only to demonstrate the calculation workflow in the absence of raw laboratory data, indicates the expected increase of overall heat-transfer coefficient with flow rate and shows how the helical configuration can be assessed against pressure-drop behavior. The procedure provides a reproducible basis for future laboratory validation and optimization of shell-side enhancement techniques.