Analysis of non-isothermal fluid flow past an in-line tube bank

In this paper the two-dimensional, non-isothermal fluid flow past an in-line tube bank has been numerically analyzed by the finite element method. The flow is assumed to be incompressible, laminar and unsteady. To stabilize the discretized equations of the continuity and momentum, the streamline-upwind/Petrov-Galerkin scheme is employed and also the energy equation is solved using the Taylor-Galerkin method. Reynolds number of 100, Prandtl number of 0.7, and pitch-to diameter ratios (PDRs) of 1.5 and 2.0 are chosen for this investigation. Having obtained the flow and the temperature fields, the local skin friction coefficient and the local Nusselt number are calculated for the tubes in the bundle at different times. A comparison of the present study results with the results of experiments of other investigators, showed good overall agreement between them.