• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.2415-2423
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• 2015

Experiments were conducted on sine wave fin-and-tube heat exchangers having oval tubes under wet condition. Oval tubes having an aspect ratio of 0.6 were made, by deforming 12.7mm round tubes. Twelve samples, having different fin pitch and tube row, were tested. Results showed that, for oval tube samples, the effect of fin pitch on j and f factor was not significant. As for the effect of tube row, the lowest j factor was obtained for one row configuration(81% of two row configuration), which is clear contrast to round tube samples, where the highest j factor was obtained for one row configuration. Possible reasoning is provided considering the flow and heat transfer characteristics of sine wave channel combined with connecting oval tubes. Comparison of $j/f^{1/3}$ with plain fin-and-tube heat exchanger having 15.9mm O.D. round tube reveals that present oval fin-and-tube heat exchanger shows superior thermal performance except for one row configuration. In other words, $j/f^{1/3}$ of the two row oval tube heat exchanger was 1.6~2.5 times larger than those of round tube heat exchanger, 1.4~2.4 times larger for three row configuration and 1.2~2.8 times for four row configuration.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.279-288
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• 2013

Heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics of fin-and-tube heat exchangers having sine wave fins and oval tubes were investigated. Oval tubes having an aspect ratio of 0.6 were made, by deforming 12.7 mm round tubes. Twelve samples, having different fin pitch and tube row, were tested. The effect of fin pitch on the j and f factors was negligible. The effect of the tube row on the j factor, however, was different from that of common fin-and-tube heat exchangers having plain fins and round tubes. The highest j factor was obtained for a two-row configuration, while the lowest one was obtained for a one-row configuration. A possible reason was attributed to the flow mixing characteristics of the sine wave channel of the present geometry. Comparison with a plain fin-and-tube heat exchanger having 15.88 mm O. D. round tube reveals that the present oval fin-and-tube heat exchanger shows generally superior thermal performance, except for the one-row configuration.