Investigation of Precipitation Fouling in Corrugated Plate Heat Exchangers

Experimental and theoretical investigations of precipitation fouling performance have been performed inside four corrugated plate heat exchangers (PHE). They have different geometry parameters, such as plate height, plate spacing, and plate angle. Heat transfer coefficient and friction factor have been obtained in the clean tests with the range of Reynolds number of 600–6000. Three precipitation fouling experiments focused on temperature influences and geometric designs have been performed. PHE with the largest hydraulic diameter and height to pitch ratio shows the best anti-fouling performance. Scanning electron microscope is used to investigate the microscopic structures of precipitation fouling. A type of Teflon coated plate has been used for testing the anti-fouling characteristic of PHEs. The coated plates show well anti-fouling performance comparing with the common SS-304 plates. A semi-empirical fouling model using Prandtl analogy has been established. The model predictions agree well with experimental data.