Coupled Heat and Mass Transfer in Absorption of Water Vapor into LiBr- Solution Flowing on Finned Inclined Surfaces

The absorption characteristics of water vapor into a LiBr-H$_2$O solution flowing down on finned inclined surfaces are numerically investigated in order to study the absorbing performances of different surface shapes of finned tubes as an absorber element. A three-dimensional numerical model is developed. The momentum, energy, and diffusion equations are solved simultaneously using a finite difference method. In order to obtain the temperature and concentration distributions, the Runge-Kutta and the Successive over relaxation methods are used. The flat, circular, elliptic, and parabolic shapes of the tube surfaces are considered in order to find the optimal surface shapes for absorption. In addition, the effects of the fin intervals and Reynolds numbers are studied. The results show that the absorption mainly happens near the fin tip due to the temperature and concentration gradient, and the absorbing performance of the parabolic surface is better than those of the other surfaces.