Thermal Analysis of Unconventional Process Condenser Using Conventional Software

Abstract

Computer aided design of products or their components is an essential part of industrial practice. The same applies to the field of thermal-hydraulic design of process and power apparatuses for heat exchange. There are several world-renowned software systems for both analyses of existing heat exchangers and for design of new equipment. The most-used ones are those developed by Heat Transfer Research, Inc. (HTRI® Xchanger Suite®), Aspen Technology, Inc. (Aspen Shell & Tube Exchanger) and Chemstations, Inc. (Chemstations™ CHEMCAD™). Educational editions of these packages are available at both mutually cooperating universities – Brno University of Technology (Czech Republic) and Augsburg University of Applied Sciences (Germany). Advantages of these sophisticated software systems are unquestionable particularly in the field of conventional heat exchanger solutions. This paper aims to summarize, compare and discuss features of the above-mentioned software packages via a specific industrial problem in which components having common geometries could not be used. For this purpose a thermal-hydraulic analysis of an unconventional steam condenser was performed using the mentioned software applications with operating parameters at the inlet of the apparatus, thermo-physical properties of streams, and geometry of the apparatus being taken from the operator of the condenser. Obtained results were then compared to experimental data.