Cooling of Hot Obstacle Filled by PCM in Channel

Abstract

A numerical study is conducted on the cooling of hot obstacle using a heat storage unit that is filled with phase change material (PCM) inside a rectangular channel with forced convection flow. The study is carried out for different thicknesses of phase change material and different heat fluxes. Also the effect of Reynolds number and Prandtl number changes on melting rate and mean temperature of hot obstacle are investigated. The results are compared with the case without PCM. The predicted results show that the mean temperature of the hot obstacle stabilizes around melting point before the melting of whole PCM occurs and after that, its value that depends on the thickness of PCM and heat flux value, is comparable with the case without PCM.