INTRODUCTION TO CONVECTIVE

HEAT TRANSFER
Prabal Talukdar
Associate Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering
IIT Delhi
E-mail: prabal@mech.iitd.ac.in
p

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Introduction to Convection
Heat transfer through a fluid is by
convection in the p
presence of bulk fluid
motion and by conduction in the absence
of it. Therefore, conduction in a fluid can be
viewed as the limiting case of convection,
corresponding to the case of quiescent
fluid

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q& conv = h (Ts T )

W / m2

&
Q
conv = hA s (Ts T )

An implication of the no-slip and the no-temperature jump conditions is

that heat transfer from the solid surface to the fluid layer adjacent to the
surface is by pure conduction, since the fluid layer is motionless, and can
be expressed as

q& conv = q& cond = k fluid

Convectionheattransferfroma
solidsurfacetoafluid

k fluid
h=

T
y

Ts T

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T
y

(W / m 2 )
y =0

conductionheattransferfromthe
conduction
heat transfer from the
solidsurfacetothefluidlayer
adjacenttothesurface

Heat is then convected

away from the surface as a
result of fluid motion
motion.
y =0

( W / m 2 .C)

Nusselt Number
q& conv = hT
q& cond = k

Nusselt number represents

p
the enhancement
of heat transfer through a fluid layer as a result of
convection relative to conduction across the same
fluid layer.
The larger the Nusselt number, the more effective
the convection.
Nu = 1 for a fluid layer represents heat transfer
across the layer by pure conduction
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T
L

q& conv hT hL
=
=
= Nu
T

q& condd k
k
L
Nu =

hL c
k

Nusselt Number
Wilhelm Nusselt, a German engineer, was born
November 25, 1882, at Nurnberg, Germany.
Nusselt studied mechanical engineering at the Munich
Technical University
University, where he got his doctorate in 1907
1907. He taught in Dresden
from 1913 to 1917.
He completed his doctoral thesis on the "Conductivity of Insulating
Materials" in 1907, using the "Nusselt Sphere" for his experiments.
In 1915, Nusselt published his pioneering paper: The Basic Laws of Heat
Transfer, in which he first proposed the dimensionless groups now
known as the principal parameters in the similarity theory of heat
transfer.

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Different types of flow

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Velocity Boundary Layer

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Surface shear stress

s =

u
y

(N / m2 )
y =0

where the constant of proportionality is called the

dynamic
y
viscosity
y of the fluid, whose unit is
kg/m . s (or equivalently, N .s/m2, or Pa.s, or poise =
0.1 Pa.s).
The ratio of dynamic viscosity to density appears frequently. For
convenience,
i
thi
this ratio
ti iis given
i
th
the name kinematic
ki
ti viscosity
i
it and
d is
i
expressed as /.
Two common units of kinematic viscosity are m2/s and stoke (1 stoke
= 1 cm2/s = 0.0001 m2/s).
)
The viscosity of a fluid is a
measure of its resistance to
2
V
flow, and it is a strong
s = C f
(N / m2 )
function of temperature
2
Experimentallydetermined
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P.Talukdar/Mech-IITD

Thermal Boundary Layer

The thickness of the thermal boundary layer t at any location along the surface is
defined as the distance from the surface at which the temperature difference T -T
Ts
equals 0.99(T -Ts).
p
case of Ts = 0, we have T = 0.99T at the outer edge
g of the
Note that for the special
thermal boundary layer, which is analogous to u = 0.99u for the velocity boundary
layer.
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The thickness of the thermal

boundary layer increases in the
flow direction

The convection heat transfer rate anywhere along the surface is directly
related to the temperature gradient at that location. T
Therefore, the shape of the temperature profile in the thermal boundary
layer dictates the convection heat transfer
Noting that the fluid velocity have a strong influence on the temperature
profile, the development of the velocity boundary layer relative to the
thermal boundary layer will have a strong effect on the convection heat
transfer.
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Prandtl number
It is named after Ludwig
Prandtl, who introduced the
concept of boundary layer in
1904 and made significant
contributions to boundary layer
theory.

Consequently the thermal boundary layer

is much thicker for liquid metals and much
thinner for oils relative to the velocity
boundary layer.
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The Prandtl numbers of gases are

about 1, which indicates that both
momentum and heat dissipate
through the fluid at about the same
rate. Heat diffuses very quickly in
liquid metals (Pr <<1) and very
slowly in oils (Pr >> 1) relative
to momentum

Ludwig Prandtl
(1875-1953)
Prandtl was born in Freising,
g, near Munich,,
in 1875.
He entered the Technische Hochschule
Munich in 1894 and graduated with a Ph.D.
under guidance of Professor August
Foeppl in six years
In 1901 Prandtl became a professor of fluid
mechanics at the Technical school in
Hannover, now the Technical University
Hannover
Doctoral students: Ackeret, Heinrich
Blasius, Busemann, Nikuradse,
Pohlhausen, Schlichting, Tietjens, Tollmien,
von Krmn, and many others (85 in total)
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Laminar / Turbulent Flow

The intense mixing of the fluid in turbulent

flow as a result of rapid fluctuations
enhances
e
a ces heat
ea a
and
d momentum
o e u transfer
a se
between fluid particles, which
increases the friction force on the surface
and the convection heat transfer
rate
rate.
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Reynolds number
BritishscientistOsbornReynolds(1842
1912)

The transition from laminar to turbulent

flow depends on the surface geometry,
surface roughness, free-stream velocity,
p
and type
yp of fluid,
surface temperature,
among other things.

Note that kinematic viscosity

has the unit m2/s, which is
identical to the unit of thermal
diffusivity, and can be viewed
as viscous diffusivity or
diffusivity for momentum.
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After exhaustive experiments in the 1880s,

Osborn Reynolds discovered that the flow
regime depends mainly on the ratio of the
inertia forces to viscous forces in the fluid

At large Reynolds numbers, the

inertia forces, which are
proportional to the density and the
velocity of the fluid, are large
relative to the viscous forces,
and thus the viscous forces cannot
prevent the random and rapid
fluctuations of the fluid.

The Reynolds number at which the flow

becomes turbulent is called the
critical Reynolds number

At small Reynolds numbers,

however, the viscous forces are
large eno
enough
gh to o
overcome
ercome the
inertia forces and to keep the fluid
in line. Thus the flow is turbulent
in the first case and laminar in the
second.

For flow over a flat plate, the generally accepted value of the critical Reynolds
number is Recr = Vxcr/ = uxcr/ = 5 x 105, where xcr is the distance from the
leading edge of the plate at which transition from laminar to turbulent flow occurs
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