Experimental Investigation on the Effect of Longitudinal Aspect Ratio on Natural Convection in Inclined Channels Heated Below

In this paper an experimental investigation on natural convection in air in inclined channels with rectangular transversal section and lower wall heated at uniform heat flux is carried out. Wall temperature measurements and flow visualization are presented. The results allow investigating on the effect of the distance between the two principal parallel walls and of the inclination angle. The experiments are accomplished for two channel gap values: 20 and 40 mm. The inclination angle is equal to 80° and 88°. The flow development and the shape of flow transitions along the channel are visualized. Flow visualization allows to describe the secondary motion inside an inclined channel. Flow separation region along the lower heated plate begins at lower axial coordinate as the wall heat flux, the inclination angle and the channel gap are greater. The flow separation depends also on transversal coordinate. The detected secondary structures pass from thermals to plumes and vortices. Along the plane parallel to the heated wall, the visualization shows that thermal plumes split in V-shaped structures. For the largest considered channel gap value the instability phenomena in the channel are stronger and chaotic motion in the channel outlet zone is observed. When the channel gap value increases wall temperatures become lower because the higher distance between the walls determines a greater mass flow rate and an increase in the heat transfer.