The Simulation of Effect of Fin on Natural Convection in Porous Non-Uniformly Heated Triangular Cavities

The effect of fin and without fin on natural convection flowing through a fluid-saturated porous medium in a triangular cavity with non-uniformly temperature on the bottom wall was simulated. The governing equations are written using Darcy model. All simulations are computed using FlexPDE Student Version 6.19. Temperatures of both inclined walls are zero while the bottom wall is non-uniform and fin is solid adiabatic. The study is performed for different Darcy-modified Rayleigh number from 100 to 1000, the position of fin from 0.4 to 0.6 and the height of fin from 0.15 to 0.3. The results are presented in terms of streamlines, isotherms and heatlines. It is observed that the fin can be used as a passive control element for flow field, temperature distribution and heat transfer.

Keywords: Thin fin, Natural convection, Non-uniform temperature, Porous medium

E-mail: supot_wa@kku.ac.th (S.Witayankurn)