Heat Transfer Characteristics of Turbulent Gas Flow Through Micro-Tubes

This paper presents experimental results on heat transfer characteristics of turbulent gas flows though a micro-tube with constant wall temperature. The experiments were performed for nitrogen gas flows through a micro-tube with 242μm in diameter and 50 mm in length. The wall temperature was maintained at 5K, 20K and 30K higher than the inlet temperature by circulating water around the micro-tube, respectively. In order to measure heat transfer rate of gas flow through a micro-tube, the total temperature at a micro-tube exit was measured. The stagnation pressure was chosen in such a way that the Reynolds number ranges from 3000 to 12000. The outlet pressure was fixed at the atmospheric condition. The total temperature at the outlet, the inlet stagnation temperature, the mass flow rate, and the inlet pressure were measured. The heat transfer rates obtained by the present study are higher than those of the incompressible flow. This is due to the additional heat transfer near the micro-tube outlet caused by the energy conversion into kinetic energy. A correlation for the prediction of the heat transfer rate of the turbulent gas flow through a micro-tube was proposed.