SEMINAR

ON

Comparative Study of Cooling Performance of

Automobile Radiator Using Al2O3-Water and
Carbon Nanotube-Water Nanofluid

Delivered by:
Under the guidiance of:
Dibyaranjan Panigrahi
Dr. Prof. P.K. Satapathy
Regd.No:1201106293
7th sem, B.Tech
Dept. of Mechanical Engineering

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

WHAT IS NANOFLUID

WHY NANOFLUID

PREPARATION OF NANOFLUID

AUTOMOBILE RADIATORS

WHY NANO FLUID IN AUTOMOBILE RADIATORS

NANOFLUID PREPARATION(AL2O3 AND CNT WATER)

EXPERIMENTAL TEST FACILITIES AND OBSERVATION

DATA REDUCTION

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

LIMITATIONS

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION
Usually single phase fluids such as water, engine oil, and ethylene
glycol (EG) possess poor thermal properties. This problem can be
overcome by dispersing small particles with high thermal
conductivity in these conventional fluids.
The fluids that contain nanosize particles are termed as nanofluids.
These fluids found to possess substantially higher thermal
conductivities compared to the base fluids.
The comparison of thermal performance for nanofluids CNT-water
and Al2O3-water has been reported in the present investigation.

WHAT IS NANOFLUID?
Suspended nanoparticles in various base fluids can alter the fluid flow
and heat transfer characteristics of the base fluids. These suspensions
of nano sized particles in the base fluids are called nanofluids.
Nanofluids are suspensions of nanoparticles in a base fluid, typically
water.
Recent development of nanotechnology brings out a new heat transfer
coolant called nanofluids. These fluids exhibit larger thermal
properties than conventional coolants.
The much larger relative surface area of nanoparticles, compared to
those of conventional particles, not only significantly improves heat
transfer capabilities, but also increases the stability of the suspension.

WHY
NANOFLUIDS ?

Conventional heat transfer fluids have inherently poor thermal conductivity

compared to solids.
Conventional fluids that contain mm- or cm-sized particles do not work
with the emerging miniaturized technologies because they can clog the
tiny channels of these devices.
Nanofluids are a new class of advanced heat-transfer fluids engineered by
dispersing nanoparticles smaller than 100 nm in diameter in conventional
heat transfer fluids.

STRUCTURE OF NANO
FLUID

Figure 1: ZrO2 in water that

produced
with Two Step method

Figure 2: Cu nanoparticles in
ethylene
glycol produced with One Step
method

PREPARATION OF NANO
Two methods are used .
FLUID
1.Two-step method
2.Single-step method

1. TWO-STEP METHOD
Two-step method is the most widely used method for preparing nanofluids.
Nanoparticles, Nanofibers, nanotubes or other nanomaterials used in this
method are first produced as dry Powders by chemical or physical methods.
Then the nanosized powder will be dispersed into a fluid in the second
processing step with the help of intensive magnetic force agitation, Ultrasonic
agitation, high-shear mixing, homogenizing and ball milling.

2. SINGLE STEP METHOD

To reduce the agglomeration of nanoparticles they developed a one-step

physical vapor condensation method to prepare Cu/ethylene glycol
nanofluids . The one-step process consists of simultaneously making and
dispersing the particles in the fluid.
In this method, the processes of drying, storage, transportation, and
dispersion of nanoparticles are avoided, so the agglomeration of
nanoparticles is minimized, and the stability of fluids is increased . The
one-step processes can prepare uniformly dispersed nanoparticles, and the
particles can be stably suspended in the base fluid.

AUTOMOBILE RADIATOR
Radiators are heat exchangers used for cooling internal combustion engines,
mainly in automobiles but also in piston-engined aircraft, railway
locomotives, motorcycles, stationary generating plant or any similar use of
such an engine.

WHY NANOFLUID IN
In general, the ethylene glycol and water mixture is used as an automotive
RADIATORS
? engines. These fluids have poor heat
coolant in the radiator of automobile
transfer performance compared to water because of lower thermal
conductivity
This problem can be overcome by dispersing small particles with high
thermal conductivity in these conventional fluids.
This improvement in heat removal rate by utilizing nanofluids could reduce
the size of the cooling system resulting in increase in the fuel economy. In
addition, the smaller size could reduce the drag and leading to lesser fuel
consumption
Thermal conductivity of Nanofluids increased by 3 reasons
1.Brownian Motion
2.Interfacial layer
3.Volume fraction of particles

EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE
CNT nanofluids with different nanoparticle concentration (= 0.15%, 0.45%,
0.60%, and 1%) were prepared by the functionalization acid treatment
method
Al2O3-water nanofluids were prepared with different nanoparticle
concentration (=0.15%, 0.45%, 0.60%, and 1%) by simply dispersing
specified amounts of nanoparticles in de-ionized water without any
surfactant.

EXPERIMENTAL SETUP

The test facility consists of

test section
ac-power supply
coolant supply system
Cooling
instrumentation scheme
An automobile radiator which is a cross flow heat
exchanger is selected as a test section for the present
investigation
For this experiment only case studies of AL2O3 water and
CNT Nanofluid are taken into consideration.

STEP BY STEP PROCEDURE

The radiator consists of 30 serpentine finned tubes with stadium shape made of
Aluminum. Each tube is of 310mm length, 20mm width, and 3 mm height (Figs.
2(a) and 2(b)). The total effective heat transfer area of the tube and fins are 0.445
m2.
The closed storage tank of 15l capacity is used to store coolant. A centrifugal pump
is used to supply coolant from the storage tank to the inlet of the test section. The
outlet supply from the test section is sent back to the storage tank and used to
recirculate through the test section.
The flow rate of the nanofluid is controlled by using bypass valve arrangement and
the remaining fluid is sent back to the storage tank. A calibrated flow meter was
used to measure the liquid flow rate with the precision of 0.1 l/min. An electrical
power supply (220V, 15A, ac) is provided to the heating elements (2 kW, 4 Nos.) in
order to heat the coolant in the storage tank.
For all the test runs, the inlet temperature is maintained at a constant temperature
of 90C.
Eight calibrated RTD PT100 type temperature sensors with an accuracy of 0.1 C are
mounted on the test section to measure outside wall temperature.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

 CNT-water nanofluid was found to exhibit enormous heat transfer performance

compared to Al2O3-water nanofluid for any value of coolant flow rate and
nanoparticle concentration.
Compared to water, CNT-water nanofluid (1% by volume) exhibited 45.87%,
66.64%, 76.55%, and 90.76% increase in the Nusselt number at flow rates 2 l/min,
3l/min, 4l/min, and 5l/min, respectively
Al2O3-water nanofluid (1% by volume) exhibited 24.66%, 39.17%, 44.18%, and
52.03% increase in the Nusselt number at coolant flow rates 2 l/min, 3 l/min, 4
l/min, and 5l/min, respectively, compared to the results with water as a coolant
The heat transfer enhancement of Al2O3-water nanofluid at nanoparticle
concentration 0.15%, 0.45%, 0.60%, and 1% are found to be 23.07%, 33.12%,
40.38%, and 52.03%, respectively, compared with water.
The enhancement in heat transfer for CNT-water nanofluid is found to be
39.95%, 57.32%, 69.42%, and 90.76% for the nanoparticle concentration of 0.15%,
0.45%, 0.60%, and 1%, respectively, compared with water.

LIMITATIONS
Lower specific heat
Specific heat of nanofluids is lower than base fluid . Namburu et al reported
that CuO/ethylene glycol nanofluids, SiO2/ethylene glycol nanofluids and
Al2O3/ethylene glycol nanofluids exhibit lower specific heat compared to base
fluids. An ideal coolant should possess higher value of specific heat which
enable the coolant to remove more heat.

High cost of nanofluids

Higher production cost of nanofluids is among the Reasons that may hinder the
application of nanofluids in industry. Nanofluids can be produced by either one
step or two steps methods. However both methods require advanced and
sophisticated equipment's.

Difficulties in production process

Another difficulty encountered in nanofluid manufacture is nanoparticles
tendency to agglomerate into larger particles, which limits the benefits of the
high surface area nanoparticles. To counter this tendency, particle dispersion
additives are often added to the base fluid with the nanoparticles.

CONCLUSION
The nanocoolants found to enhance

the thermal performance of the

automobile radiator.
The maximum heat transfer performance for 1.0 vol. % nanoparticle
concentration were found to be 90.76% and 52.03% higher for CNT-water and
Al2O3-water, respectively, compared with water.
With the increase in the coolant flow rate, the heat transfer performance
increases for various coolants, namely, water, CNT-water and Al2O3-water.
The CNT-water nanofluid exhibited enormous enhancement in heat transfer
compared to the Al2O3-water nanofluid. This may be due to the fact that
carbon nanotubes offer a high thermal conductivity, high aspect ratio, low
specific gravity, and large SSA and low thermal resistance as compared Al 2O3water nanofluid.
The effective thermal conductivity of both CNT-water and Al 2O3-water
nanocoolant increases with the increase in nanoparticles concentration,
consequently, increases the cooling performance in automobile radiator.

REFERENCES
ChoiU. S., SingerD. A., and WangH. P., 1995, Development and Application of Non-Newtonian
Flows, Vol. 231, ASME, New York, pp. 99105.
ChoiS., 2006, Nanofluids for Improved Efficiency in Cooling Systems, Heavy Vehicle Systems
Review, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois.
Kulkarni, D. P., Vajjha, R. S., Das, D. K., and Oliva, D., 2011 Application of Aluminum Oxide
Nanofluids in Diesel Electric Generators Jacket Water Coolant, Appl. Therm. Eng., 28, pp. 1774
1781. [CrossRef]
Vajjha, R. S., Das, D. K., and Namburu, P. K., 2010, Numerical Study of Fluid Dynamic and Heat
Transfer Performance of Al2O3 and CuO Nanofluids in the Flat Tubes of a Radiator, Int. J. Heat
Fluid Flow, 31, pp. 613621. [CrossRef]
Peyghambarzadeh, S. M., Hashemabadi, S. H., Jamnani, M. S., and Hoseini, S. H., 2011,
Improving the Cooling Performance of Automobile Radiator With Al2O3/Water Nanofluid, Appl.
Therm. Eng., 31(10), pp. 18331838. [CrossRef]
Leong, K. Y., Saidur, R., Kazi, S. N., and Mamun, A. H., 2010, Performance Investigation of an
Automotive Car Radiator Operated With Nanofluid-Based Coolants (Nanofluid as a Coolant in a
Radiator), Appl. Therm. Eng., 30, pp. 26852692. [CrossRef]