Fundamentals of Heat and Mass Transfer

Chapter 12

Heat Exchangers

12.1 Introduction

‘Heat exchanger’ is one of the most commonly used process equipments in industry and research. Function of a heat exchanger is to transfer energy; this transfer of energy may occur to a single fluid (as in the case of a boiler where heat is transferred to water) or between two fluids that are at different temperatures (as in the case of an automobile radiator where heat is transferred from hot water to air). In some cases, there are more than two streams of fluid exchanging heat in a heat exchanger. Heat exchangers of several designs in a variety of sizes varying from ‘miniature’ to ‘huge’ (with heat transfer areas of the order of 5000 to 10,000 sq. metres) have been developed over the years.

Some ...