Title

Unsteady laminar buoyant flow through rectangular vents in large enclosures

Authors

Authors

R. Kumar; A. Sleiti;J. Kapat

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

J. Thermophys. Heat Transf.

Keywords

DRIVEN EXCHANGE FLOW; NATURAL-CONVECTION; DEPRESSURIZATION; REACTOR; MOTION; DUCTS; Thermodynamics; Engineering, Mechanical

Abstract

This computational study concentrates on transient laminar How of air through rectangular vents in horizontal partitions between two large enclosures. For a vent aspect ratio of 1, three flow regimes were identified as the Rayleigh number (Ra) was varied from 1 x 10(3) to 5 x 10(4) based on flow parameters in the vent and corresponding modes of heat transfer through it. The Rayleigh number was found to be the critical control parameter, which determined the flow regimes of conduction, countercurrent, and oscillatory flow regimes. As the effective driving potential decreased with time, flow changed from one regime to the other so that higher-Rayleigh-number results showed all three regimes over time. Circulation patterns within the vent for the conduction regime (Ra < 1500) appeared to follow Chandrasekhar's well-known linear stability results. At higher Ra, sudden bursts of upflow with corresponding downflow have been documented and compared with experimental observations in the literature. The time traces of velocity and temperature fields for this flow regime reveal interesting mechanisms, which have been explained.

Journal Title

Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer

Volume

20

Issue/Number

2

Publication Date

1-1-2006

Document Type

Article

Language

English

First Page

276

Last Page

284

WOS Identifier

WOS:000237330600011

ISSN

0887-8722

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