A numerical investigation of the effect of surface wettability on the boiling curve

Hua-Yi Hsu; Ming-Chieh Lin; Bridget Popovic; Chii-Ruey Lin; Neelesh A Patankar

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0187175

A numerical investigation of the effect of surface wettability on the boiling curve

PLoS One. 2017 Nov 10;12(11):e0187175. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0187175. eCollection 2017.

Authors

Hua-Yi Hsu¹, Ming-Chieh Lin², Bridget Popovic³, Chii-Ruey Lin¹, Neelesh A Patankar³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan.
² Department of Electrical and Biomedical Engineering, Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea.
³ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, United States of America.

Abstract

Surface wettability is recognized as playing an important role in pool boiling and the corresponding heat transfer curve. In this work, a systematic study of pool boiling heat transfer on smooth surfaces of varying wettability (contact angle range of 5° - 180°) has been conducted and reported. Based on numerical simulations, boiling curves are calculated and boiling dynamics in each regime are studied using a volume-of-fluid method with contact angle model. The calculated trends in critical heat flux and Leidenfrost point as functions of surface wettability are obtained and compared with prior experimental and theoretical predictions, giving good agreement. For the first time, the effect of contact angle on the complete boiling curve is shown. It is demonstrated that the simulation methodology can be used for studying pool boiling and related dynamics and providing more physical insights.

MeSH terms

Hot Temperature*
Models, Theoretical
Physical Phenomena
Surface Properties
Wettability*

Grants and funding

This study was supported by the Taiwan Ministry of Science and Technology to HYH, the McCormick Catalyst Award from Northwestern University to NAP, and by Hanyang University to MCL. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.