Computational Simulation of Natural Convection Heat Transfer From A Flat Surface in a Vertical Rectangular Duct

The balance between environmental concerns and economic sustainability has leaded scientist to find energy efficient alternatives to conventional technologies. Especially for industries using energy transport technologies (e.g. heat exchangers, gas turbines), optimization of energy transport mechanisms may be the most important factor to maintain the balance. In order to develop better heat transfer systems the mechanisms involved in heat transfer should be understood clearly. With the development of better computational resources the numerical simulations have filled the gaps in understanding of heat transfer systems, which could not be answered experimentally. Although there are numerous numerical and experimental studies on heat transfer mechanisms, the complicated behavior of heat transfer systems are yet to be cleared. In this study heat transfer from a flat surface in a vertical rectangular duct is numerically and experimentally investigated. The experimental results are used to validate the numerical results obtained with COMSOL Multiphysics (v.5.1). The main goal is to sort out numerical complications encountered in simulation of natural convection heat transfer with COMSOL Multiphysics (v.5.1) in order to obtain further numerical results without doubt. The validated numerical results are presented along with the discussion of numerical complications encountered.