The effect of non-circular perforation holes in term of circularity of V-shaped blockages attached to one heated wall of a rectangular duct of solar air heater. Five different hole shapes ranging from circular to square to rectangular in the circularity range of 1–0.6 have been used with varying relative pitch of 4–12, relative blockage height of 0.4–1.0, open area ratio of 5–25% and angle of attack of 30–75 and Reynolds number of flow was varied between 2000 and 20,000. It has been found that there exists an optimum non-circular shape of perforation holes that yields maximum value of Nusselt number; a perfectly circular hole performs substantially inferior as compared to a non-circular hole of considerable non-circularity (w = 0.69). An improvement of Nusselt number value in the ratio of 1.13 has been found when circular perforation holes are replaced by rectangular holes of circularity of 0.69. Correlations of Nusselt number as well of friction factor are established in term of Reynolds number and geometrical parameters of blockages which can be used to predict the values of Nusselt number and friction factor with considerably good accuracy.
Perforated V-shaped blockages attached on one broad wall which is exposed to uniform heat flux in solar air heater duct have been investigated with respected to heat transfer and friction characteristics. The effect of circularity of perforation holes, relative pitch ratio, relative blockage height, open area ratio and angle of attack on Nusselt number and friction factor has been studied for flow Reynolds number range of 2000–20,000. The major findings
of this study are given below:
(1) Non-circular perforation holes was been found to result in higher heat transfer as compared to circular holes with same open area ratio; and there is optimum non-circular shape that corresponds to a circularity of 0.69.
(2) Maximum enhancement in Nusselt number and friction factor is found to correspond to an angle attack value of 60.
(3) The highest increase in the value of Nusselt number has been observed at a relative pitch of 8, however the highest observed value of friction factor corresponding to relative pitch of 4.
(4) Nusselt number and friction factor correlations have been developed which can predict the corresponding values of Nusselt number and friction factor with the absolute percentage deviation of 5.03% and 4.99%, respectively.