Numerical investigation of heat transfer in extended surface microchannels

Abstract

Microchannel heat sinks (MCHS's) are currently projected as twenty first century cooling solution. In the present numerical study, heat transfer enhancement in microchannel using extended surface has been carried out. Rectangular microchannel and cylindrical microfins are used in current study. Three different configurations of extended surface microchannel; Case I (upstream finned microchannel), Case II (downstream finned microchannel) and Case III (complete finned microchannel) are compared with plain rectangular microchannel. It is found that heat transfer performance of Case I is better than Case II. Case I even performs better than Case III at low Reynolds number. Average surface temperature is also significantly reduced in case of extended surface microchannels. Optimization of extended surface microchannel has also been successively carried out following univariate search method for number of fins, pitch, diameter and height of fins. Average heat transfer enhancement in optimized case is around 160% with acceptable pressure drop penalty. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.