Influence of thickness of metal foam on the conduction and convection heat transfer for a flat plate with metal foam impinged by a single circular air jet

ABSTRACTThe effect of the metal foam thickness on the conduction and convection heat transfer for a metal foam flat plate impinged by a circular air jet is investigated. The IR thermography and thin-metal foil technique are used for the measurement of local heat transfer. An open-cell aluminum metal foam is used for the metal foam flat plate. A 3D-printed resin foam and detached metal foam flat plate are used for the appreciation of the conduction and convection heat transfer. The varying parameters are the thickness of the foam, Reynolds number, and the nozzle exit to plate distance. The presence of the metal foam offers a conduction effect. This predominates over the attenuation in the convective heat transfer by foam due to additional hydraulic resistance. The additional hydraulic resistance offered by the porous foam increases with the increase in the foam thickness. The heat transfer of a porous foamed flat plate decreases with the increase in the foam thickness. The local Nusselt number of the resin foam and detached foam flat plate is almost the same. The conduction effect and attenuation in the convection heat transfer of a metal foam flat plate are quantified by attenuation and enhancement factors. The overall augmentation offered by 4, 8, and 12 mm thick metal foam flat plates is 1.71, 1.42, and 1.43 times compared to the smooth flat plate case, respectively. Hence, it is advisable to use a metal foam flat plate with 4-mm-thick metal foam under circular air jet impingement.KEYWORDS: jet impingementporous mediaIR thermographyconduction convection separationthickness effect AcknowledgmentsThe authors acknowledge the efforts put in by Mr Rahul Shirsat in building the experimental setup and fixing the mechanical problems during the experiments.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.