Convective Heat Transfer Performance of FC-72 in a Pin-Finned Channel

This study investigates the influence of the heat flux and mass velocity on convective heat transfer performance of FC-72 in a rectangular channel of 20mm in width and 2 mm in height. The heated side has either a smooth surface or a pin-finned surface. The inlet fluid temperature is maintained at 30°C. The total length of the test channel is 113 mm, with a heated length of 25mm. The flow rate varies between 80 and 960 ml/min, and the heat flux sets between 18 and 50 W/cm². The experimental results show that the controlling variable is heat flux instead of flow rate because of the boiling activities in FC-72. At a fixed flow rate, the pin-finned surface yields up to 20% higher heat transfer coefficient and greater critical heat flux than those of a smooth surface.