Numerical study of flow visualization and thermal performance for pulsating heat pipes

Importance of study of pulsating heat pipes (PHPs) behavior and limitations in conducting experimental studies, the necessity of numerical simulations is getting critical in this area. In present work, numerical simulations are carried out for pulsating heat pipes. Thermal performance of closed loop pulsating heat pipes is investigated at different operating conditions such as evaporator heating power and filling ratio. Water, ethanol, methanol and acetone are employed as working fluids. A two-dimensional single loop PHP is used for present study. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) video technique is employed for flow visualization purpose. Perfect match was observed between the present CFD video clip and previous experimental video-based studies in terms of flow pattern and behavior. Present study shows how researchers can benefit from developments of numerical tools to test pulsating heat pipes behavior at different operating conditions or different working fluids without facing difficulties and limitations of applying laboratory thermal measurement equipment or high-speed cameras. The CFD video clip as result of numerical simulation was found very informative for flow visualization purpose. The simulated clip made it much easier to capture phenomena occur in a pulsating heat pipe. The thermal performance investigation at different operating conditions and working fluids was found very informative in terms of application and design purposes especially for experimental studies. By increasing heating power greater than 60 W, circulation velocity was increased for most cases. Phase contour videos are inserted at the bottom of the article.