Internal cooling of the trailing edge region in a gas turbine blade is typically achieved with an array of pin fins. In order to better understand the effectiveness of this configuration, high performance computations are performed on cylindrical pin fins with a spanwise distance to fin diameter ratio of 2 and height over fin diameter ratio of one. For validation purposes, the flow Reynolds number based on hydraulic channel diameter and bulk velocity (Re = 12,800) was set to match experiments available in the open literature. Simulations included a URANS and LES on a single row of pin fins where the URANS domain was 1 pin wide versus the LES with 3 pins. The resulting time-dependent flow field was analyzed using a variation of bi-orthogonal decomposition (BOD), where the correlation matrices were built using the internal energy in addition to the three velocity components. This enables a detailed comparison of URANS and LES to assess the URANS modeling assumptions as well as a flow decomposition with respect to the flow structure’s influence on surface heat transfer. This analysis shows low order modes which do not contribute to turbulent heat flux, but instead increase the heat exchanger’s global inefficiency. In the URANS study, the forth mode showed the first nonzero temperature basis function, which means that a considerable amount of energy is contained in flow structures that do not contribute to increasing endwall heat transfer. In the LES, the first non zero temperature basis function was the seventh mode. Both orthogonal basis function sets were evaluated with respect to each mode’s contribution to turbulent heat exchange with the surface. This analysis showed that there exists one distinct, high energy mode that contributes to wall heat flux, whereas all others do not. Modifying this mode could potentially be used to improve the heat exchanger’s efficiency with respect to pressure loss.
Skip Nav Destination
e-mail: schwaenen@tamu.edu
Article navigation
Heat Transfer In Nanochannels, Microchannels, And Minichannels
Identifying Inefficiencies in Unsteady Pin Fin Heat Transfer Using Orthogonal Decomposition
Markus Schwänen,
Markus Schwänen
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
e-mail: schwaenen@tamu.edu
Texas A&M University
, College Station, TX 77843
Search for other works by this author on:
Andrew Duggleby
Andrew Duggleby
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Texas A&M University
, College Station, TX 77843
Search for other works by this author on:
Markus Schwänen
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Texas A&M University
, College Station, TX 77843e-mail: schwaenen@tamu.edu
Andrew Duggleby
Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Texas A&M University
, College Station, TX 77843J. Heat Transfer. Feb 2012, 134(2): 020904 (10 pages)
Published Online: December 13, 2011
Article history
Received:
November 5, 2010
Revised:
August 3, 2011
Online:
December 13, 2011
Published:
December 13, 2011
Citation
Schwänen, M., and Duggleby, A. (December 13, 2011). "Identifying Inefficiencies in Unsteady Pin Fin Heat Transfer Using Orthogonal Decomposition." ASME. J. Heat Transfer. February 2012; 134(2): 020904. https://doi.org/10.1115/1.4004873
Download citation file:
Get Email Alerts
Cited By
On Prof. Roop Mahajan's 80th Birthday
J. Heat Mass Transfer
Thermal Hydraulic Performance and Characteristics of a Microchannel Heat Exchanger: Experimental and Numerical Investigations
J. Heat Mass Transfer (February 2025)
Related Articles
The Augmentation of Internal Blade Tip-Cap Cooling by Arrays of Shaped Pins
J. Turbomach (October,2008)
Film Cooling From a Row of Holes Supplemented With Antivortex Holes
J. Turbomach (April,2009)
Related Proceedings Papers
Related Chapters
Control and Operational Performance
Closed-Cycle Gas Turbines: Operating Experience and Future Potential
Extended Surfaces
Thermal Management of Microelectronic Equipment
Extended Surfaces
Thermal Management of Microelectronic Equipment, Second Edition