Experimental studies on heat transfer and friction factor characteristics of turbulent flow through a circular tube fitted with helical screw-tape inserts

Experimental investigation of heat transfer and friction factor characteristics of circular tube fitted with full-length helical screw element of different twist ratio, and increasing and decreasing order of twist ratio set have been studied with uniform heat flux under turbulent flow conditions. The Reynolds number was varied from 2700 to 13 500. The experimental data obtained are compared with those obtained from plain tube published data. The maximum Nusselt number for the twist of 1.95 was obtained. The performance of the helical twist insert was compared with the twisted tape performance reported in the literature and found that it is better than twisted tape performance. The heat transfer augmentation for helical twist of increasing and decreasing order twist were also presented. The empirical correlations developed relating twist ratio and Reynolds number, are fitting the experimental data within +/- 13% and +/- 15% for Nusselt number and friction factor, respectively. The performance evaluation study has been presented to check the potential of using the helical twist insert. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.