Numerical Simulation On The Optimization Of Fin Structure In Automotive Heat Exchangers

The louvered fin, a major component of heat exchanger, has been widely applied in vehicle cooling system for its compactness. Although the louvered-fin-based heat exchanger can achieve good heat-transfer performance, it would inevitably lead to a significant pressure drop. Thus, more fan power input is required. Facing the challenging issue posed by the heat exchanger, alternative solution concerning the heat transfer as well as the flow performance is of ever-increasing interests. In this study, a 3-D model has been proposed to optimize the fin structure. It helps advance the scientific understanding of fin-related heat transfer and paves the way to a versatile fin of better performance.The influence of the louver fin configurations, including louver angle θ, louver pinch L_p, fin pinch F_p, fin thickness δ and the deflecting length S₂, on the heat-exchange and flow performance has been separately studied. The impact level of each structure parameter has been calculate and it was found that θ, L_p, F_p and δ can influence the final performance considerably, while S₂ presented the least influence on the fin performance.Then, an orthogonal design based on θ, L_p, F_p and δ has been conducted to find the optimal combination of these parameters. One of the major findings is that fin with small fin pinch, small louver angle and small louver pinch contributes to a better heat-exchanger and flow performance.Finally, two methods based on entropy and entranspy have been introduced to the fin configuration optimization for several operational conditions. The results showed that the entranspy method is more suitable for heating applications, while the entropy method is more suitable for cooling applications.