Natural Convective Heat Transfer From an Inclined Narrow Isothermal Flat Plate

Natural convective heat transfer rate from an isothermal flat plate inclined at moderate angles to the vertical has been numerically studied. When the plate is wide compared to its height the flow can be adequately modeled by assuming two-dimensional flow. However, when the width of the plate is relatively small compared to its height, the heat transfer rate can be considerably greater than that predicted by these two-dimensional flow results. The heat transfer from a narrow isothermal plate embedded in a plane adiabatic surface, the adiabatic surface being in the same plane as the heated plate and inclined at an angle to the vertical has been numerically considered. Results for both positive and negative inclination angles have been numerically determined here. Attention was restricted to results for a Prandtl number of 0.7; this being approximately the value existing in the application that originally motivated this study. It has been assumed that the fluid properties are constant except for the density change with temperature which gives rise to the buoyancy forces, this having been treated by using the Boussinesq approach. It has also been assumed that the flow is symmetrical about the vertical centre-plane of the plate. The solution has been obtained by numerically solving the full three-dimensional form of the governing equations, these equations being written in dimensionless form. The solution was obtained using a commercial finite element method based code, FIDAP. The solution has the Rayleigh number, the dimensionless plate width, the angle of inclination, and the Prandtl number as parameters. Results have been obtained for Rayleigh numbers between 10³ and 10⁷ for ratios of the plate width to the plate height of between 0.3 and 1.5 and for angles of inclination between +45° and −45°.