The design of a plate-fin heat exchanger requires the use of a special terminology.

First, a terminology is required to define the geometric

characteristics of a particular surface geometry. Second, certain relations are required to define the geometry of the heat exchanger. The
geometric factors needed to specify the fin geometry are (1) the basic surface description, (2) plate spacing b, (3) hydraulic diameter Dh,
(4) fin thickness δ, (5) surface area per unit volume between parting sheets β, and (6) fraction of total surface area formed by the fins Af /A.
The derived geometric factors Dh, β, and Af /A are calculable for each fin surface geometry.

Figure below shows typical surface geometries used for heat transfer to gases in compact plate-fin heat exchangers. The figure shows six
basic types of surface geometry, and defines the geometric variables associated with each type. By varying the basic geometric variables
for each type of surface, it is possible to obtain a wide variety of specific surface geometries.

Figure 1 Plate-fin exchanger surface geometries (Webb and Kim, 2005): (a) plain rectangular fins; (b) plain
triangular; (c) wavy; (d) offset strip; (e) perforated; (f) louvered

The rectangular and triangular fins are simple, plain fin geometries that offer increased heat transfer because of their small hydraulic
radius. The addition of perforations or holes in the fin surface provides some heat transfer increase as a result of wake mixing that occurs
in the hole regions. The wavy fins yield increased heat transfer because of secondary flows established by the wavy channel. The offset-
strip fin, louvered, and pin fins all provide significant heat transfer augmentation via the repeated growth of laminar boundary layers,
followed by dissipation in the wake regions. The offset fin provides heat transfer coefficients two to three times higher than a plain fin
geometry having the same fin pitch. The louver fin geometry is typically used in automotive heat exchangers, while the offset-strip fin is
typically used in large brazed aluminum heat exchangers for cryogenic applications and in aerospace applications.