CFD simulation and experimental investigation of pressure-drop through 90° and 30° angled compact heat-exchangers relative to the oncoming airflow

This paper presents pressure-drop and airflow characteristics for compact heat-exchangers, where the relative airflow is angled 90 degrees and 30 degrees. The investigation is based on two heat-exchangers with different thicknesses, investigated for a number of airflow rates. The results are obtained from experiments and CFD simulations, where both a part of a detailed heat-exchanger and the complete test set-up have been simulated. The results showed that the thin heat-exchanger at 30 degrees gave 70% of the pressure-drop obtained for the 90 degrees angle, and at the same time resulted in a higher heat-transfer rate.