The heat transfer characteristics of a transformer using both standard mineral oil and nanodiamond oil was investigated numerically and compared to experimental measurements. The results of the model agree well with the standard oil measurements and with theoretical convective flows from the literature. However, the simulations could not predict the magnitude of the temperature variation in the nanodiamond oil, although the appropriate trend was observed. Because properties of the nanodiamond transformer oil are not well known, good agreement is not expected. Nevertheless, nanodiamond in transformer oil shows enhanced heat transfer performance over standard transformer oil.

Volume Subject Area:
Fluids Engineering
Topics:
Convection, Mineral oil, Heat transfer, Engineering simulation, Flow (Dynamics), Simulation, Temperature
1.
EPRI, 2003. Evaluation of vegetable oils for retrofilling distribution and power transformers. Tech. Rep. 1009108, Electric Power Reseach Institute.
2.
Board, I. S., 1995. Ieee guide for loading mineral-oil-immersed transformers. Tech. Rep. C57.91, IEEE.
3.
Wang
X.
, and
Xu
X.
,
1999
. “
Thermal conductivity of nanoparticle-fluid mixture
.”
Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer
,
13
(
4
), pp.
474
–
480
.
4.
Keblinski
P.
,
Phillpot
S. R.
,
C.
S. U. S.
, and
Eastman
J. A.
,
2002
. “
Mechanism of heat flow in suspensions of nanosized particles (nanofluids)
.”
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer
,
45
, pp.
855
–
863
.
5.
Choi, S. U. S., 1995. “Enhancing thermal conductivity of fluids with nanoparticles.” In Developments and Applications of Non-Newtonian Fluids, D. A. Siginer and H. P. Wang, eds. American Society of Mechanical Engineers, New York, pp. 99–105.
6.
Maxwell, J. C., 1881. A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, 2 ed., Vol. 1. Clarendon Press, Oxford, UK.
7.
Eastman
J. A.
,
Choi
S. U. S.
,
Li
S.
,
Yu
W.
, and
Thompson
L. J.
,
2001
. “
Anomalously increased effective thermal conductivities of ethylene glycol-based nanofluids containing copper nanoparticles
.”
Applied Physics Letters
,
78
(
6
), pp.
718
–
720
.
8.
Hong
T.-K.
,
Yang
H.-S.
, and
Choi
C. J.
,
2005
. “
Study of the enhanced thermal conductivity of Fe nanofluids
.”
Journal of Applied Physics
,
97
(
064311
064311
).
9.
Eastman
J. A.
,
Phillpot
S. R.
,
Choi
S. U. S.
, and
Keblinski
P.
,
2004
. “
Thermal transport in nanofluids
.”
Annual Reviews in Materials Research
,
34
, pp.
219
–
246
.
10.
Masuda
H.
,
Ebata
A.
,
Teramae
K.
, and
Hishinuma
N.
,
1993
. “
Alteration of thermal conductivity and viscosity of liquid by dispersing ultra-fine particles (dispersion of al2o3, sio2, and tio2 ultrafine particles)
.”
Netsu Bussei (Japan)
,
4
, pp.
227
–
233
.
11.
Lee
S.
,
Choi
S. U. S.
,
Li
S.
, and
Eastman
J. A.
,
1999
. “
Measuring thermal conductivity of fluids containing oxide nanoparticles
.”
Journal of Heat Transfer
,
121
(
2
), pp.
280
–
289
.
12.
Patel
H. E.
,
Das
S. K.
,
Sundararajan
T.
,
Nair
A. S.
,
George
B.
, and
Pradeep
T.
,
2003
. “
Thermal conductivities of naked and monolayer protected metal nanoparticle based nanofluids: manifestation of anomalous enhancement and chemical effects
.”
Applied Physics Letters
,
83
(
14
), Oct., pp.
2931
–
2933
.
13.
Xie
H.
,
Wang
J.
,
Xi
T.
,
Liu
Y.
, and
Ai
F.
,
2002
. “
Thermal conductivity of suspension containing SiC particles
.”
Journal of Materials Science Letters
,
21
, pp.
193
–
195
.
14.
Pak
B. C.
, and
Cho
Y. I.
,
1998
. “
Hydrodynamic and heat transfer study of dispersed fluids with submicron metallic oxide particles
.”
Experimental Heat Transfer
,
11
, pp.
151
–
170
.
15.
Bradshaw, D., Campbell, F., Ingram, M., Davidson, J., Kang, W. P., Wells, F., Barnett, J., Taylor, P., Strauss, A., Soh, K. L., Holmes, K., and Fisher, T., 2004. “A novel transformer oil additive to extend transformer rating and/or life.” In EPRI Substation Equipment Diagnostics Conference.
16.
Grossman
S.
, and
Lohse
D.
,
2004
. “
Scaling in thermal convection: a unifying theory
.”
Journal of Fluid Mechanics
,
407
, pp.
27
–
56
.
17.
Ahlers
G.
,
2000
. “
Effect of sidewall on heat-transportmeasurements for turbulent rayleigh-be´nard convection
.”
Physical Review E
,
63
(
015303)
015303)
.
18.
Busse
F. H.
,
1978
. “
Non-linear properties of thermal convection
.”
Rep. Prog. Phys.
,
41
, pp.
1929
–
1967
.
19.
Gelfgat
A. Y.
,
Bar-Yosef
P. Z.
,
Solan
A.
, and
Kowaleski
T. A.
,
2004
. “
An axisymmetry-breaking instability of axially symmetry natural convection
.”
International Journal of Transport Phenomena
,
1
, pp.
173
–
190
.
20.
Gelfga
A. Y.
, and
Bar-Yosef
P. Z.
,
2004
. “
Multiple solutions and stability of confined convective an swirling flows—a contiuing challenge
.”
International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat and Fluid Flow
,
14
(
2
), pp.
213
–
241
.
21.
Kaminski
E.
, and
Jaupart
C.
,
2003
. “
Laminar starting plumes in high-prandtl-number fluids
.”
Journal of Fluid Mechanics
,
478
, pp.
287
–
298
.
This content is only available via PDF.
Copyright © 2005
 by ASME
You do not currently have access to this content.