Chemical process equipment

design
By
RECHARD TURTON
 Heat Transfer Resistances Due to Fouling

• In designing heat exchangers, it is important to make allowance for

the deposition of scale, that is, the process of fouling, on heat-
exchanger surfaces and the subsequent reduction in overall heat
transfer due to the fouling process.
 Thermal Conductivities of Common Metals
and Tube Properties
• Thermal conductivities for metals usually used as heat-exchanger
tubes or in extended surface (compact) heat exchangers are given in
Table 2.3. For low-temperature service such as cryogenic air
separation, aluminum and stainless steel are the preferred materials
of construction. It should be noted that the thermal conductivities of
most metals do not vary widely over quite large temperature
changes, and usually the resistance to conduction through the wall is
not the limiting resistance, so minor changes in thermal conductivity
rarely have a significant effect on heat exchanger design or
performance.
 Correlations for Film Heat Transfer
Coefficients
• The following sections cover the estimation of the convective film
heat transfer coefficients. The cases for convective flow without
phase change for inside and outside tubes (internal and external
flows) are covered first. The coefficients for a change of phase are
then introduced
 Flow Inside Tubes

• In heat-exchanger design, the most common geometry for the

equipment uses circular tubes, and the bulk of correlations and
experimental work has been done for this geometry. The type of flow,
turbulent, laminar, or transition, has a strong influence on the form of
the correlation used to determine the film heat transfer coefficient.
Each flow regime is considered separately in the following sections
 Turbulent Flow
• For a fluid flowing inside a tube or pipe, the heat transfer coefficient
is a function of fluid properties, fluid velocity, and the diameter of the
tube. Many correlations exist for estimating the heat transfer
coefficients for flow in tubes, and one of the most common is the
Seider-Tate (1936) equation:
 Flow Outside of Tubes –Shell Side Flow
• The estimation of the heat transfer coefficient for the flow of a fluid
over a bundle of tubes is very complicated. Referring back to Figure
2.18, in an S-T exchanger, the flow on the shell side is parallel with the
tube axis for some portion of the flow path and perpendicular to the
tube axis for the remainder of the time. Moreover, the flow path of
the shell-side fluid is quite tortuous, since it flows around and
between the tubes, and the arrangement of the tubes (square or
triangular pitch) significantly affects the mixing and turbulence of the
fluid. Needless to say, analytical expressions for heat transfer
coefficients do not exist, and the number of correlations for overall
shell-side heat transfer coefficient are numerous.
Flow Normal to the Outside of a Single
Cylinder
 Kern’s Method for Shell-Side Heat Transfer
• A popular method for making a preliminary estimate of the shell-side
heat transfer coefficient and shell-side pressure drop is that
attributed to Kern (1950). The correlations used in Kern’s method
depend on an equivalent hydraulic diameter for the shell side, DH,s.
Figure 2.26 shows the basic tube arrangements
Square pitch
Triangular pitch
• The term (p − Do) is sometimes referred to as the clearance, C. The
shell-side fluid changes velocity as it passes through the baffle
window and travels across the bank of tubes. This situation is
illustrated in Figure 2.27, where the inside diameter of the shell is Ds ,
and the baffle spacing is Lb.
• Assuming that the mass flowrate of fluid on the shell side is m˙s , then
using the notation in Figures 2.26 and 2.27, the following parameters
are defined: Shell-side superficial mass velocity:
 Extended Surfaces
• the heat transfer coefficients for gases are generally much lower than
for liquids or for phase changes. Indeed, the limiting heat transfer
coefficient will be the gas film coefficient if a gas is one of the fluids in
the exchanger. To increase the effective gas film coefficient, it is often
necessary to add some form of extended heat transfer surface or fins
to the gas side of the heat exchanger. Some examples of finned tubes
were given in Figures 2.22 and 2.23. Some additional arrangements of
fins are given in Figure 2.31
Rectangular Fin with Constant Thickness
• The value of ε indicates the efficiency by which the additional fin
surface area is being utilized.
• In other words, the good news is that the fin provides more area
for heat transfer,
• but the bad news is that the driving force may decrease down the
length of the fin, so all of the benefit of the increased area is not
seen. The effectiveness factor quantifies this situation.
Annular or Circular Fins of Uniform Thickness
Narrow Triangular Fin
 Pressure Drop Considerations
• For the tube-side fluid, the standard term for the frictional pressure
drop in circular tubes can be used with the addition of four velocity
heads per return due to changes in fluid direction for multiple tube
passes. The recommended equation is:
 Total Heat Transfer Surface Effectiveness

• Up until this point, the efficiency of single fins of different geometries

has been considered. However, multiple fins are always used in real
heat exchangers. Consider a set of fins stacked as shown in Figure
2.35. For the case of rectangular straight fins, shown in Figure 2.35(a),
consider a section of wall of area W(δ + b). Without fins, this would
be the area exposed to the fluid; with fins, the heat transfer area
becomes Wb + 2LW.
• Assuming that the film heat transfer coefficient, h, between the
surface and the surrounding fluid does not vary with position, then an
energy balance for the surface gives:
Design Algorithm
 Example 2.16
• Determine a preliminary rating for a heat exchanger with the
following service: 19,900 kg/h of kerosene leaves a distillation column
at 200°C and will be cooled to 93°C by 67,880 kg/h of crude oil from
storage that is to be heated from 38°C to 76°C. A maximum pressure
drop of 70 kPa is permissible for both streams. A scale factor (Rf) of
0.000053m2 K/W should be used for this service, which is mainly
caused by the crude oil. Based on previous experience, 1-in diameter,
16 ft long, 12 BWG tubes should be used (these may be changed if
needed), and the crude oil should flow inside the tubes.