Effects of surface orientation on nucleate boiling heat transfer in a pool of water under atmospheric pressure

Abstract The basic wall boiling model widely used in computation fluid dynamics codes gives no regard to influences of surface orientation upon boiling mechanism. This study aims at examining the effects of surface orientation on wall heat flux and bubble parameters in pool nucleate boiling and incorporating those into the wall boiling model. Boiling experiments on a flat plate heater submerged in a pool of saturated water were conducted under atmospheric pressure. Relevant bubble parameters as well as boiling heat transfer characteristics were simultaneously measured using a unique optical setup integrating shadowgraph, total reflection and infrared thermometry techniques. It was observed that as an upward-facing heater surface with a constant wall superheat of 7.5 °C inclines from horizontal towards vertical, the heat flux significantly increased; nucleation site density increased intensively at the upper part of the heater surface where thermal boundary layer might become thickened; isolated boiling bubbles tend to slide up due to buoyancy and coalesce with each other, thus forming one single large bubble. Such observations on the wall heat flux and bubble parameters according to surface orientation could not be predicted by the present basic wall boiling model only centered with isolated bubbles. A modified wall boiling model incorporating the effects of merging of isolated bubbles on an inclined surface was proposed. The model reasonably predicted the experimental data on various orientation angles.