THERMAL SCIENCE

International Scientific Journal

Haydar Kepekci

,

Mirko S KomatinaORCID

THE CFD INVESTIGATION ON HEAT TRANSFER PERFORMANCE OF DIFFERENT PIPE GEOMETRIES AT VARIOUS REYNOLDS NUMBERS

ABSTRACT
In this study, three different pipe geometries have been evaluated to investigate the effects of pipe geometry on heat transfer for incompressible flows at different Reynolds numbers. The selected geometries have been determined as dimpled, corrugated, and helical. The study performed 3-D analyses, and Reynolds numbers were selected as 2000, 3000, 4000, and 5000. The SST k-ω model has been used in the turbulent flow regime, while laminar flow conditions have been analyzed using the appropriate solver settings. The obtained results have been compared using heat transfer coefficient values and skin friction coefficient. The helical pipe demonstrated the highest heat transfer coefficient among all geometries, with a value of 1951 W/m²K at Re = 5000, while the dimpled and corrugated pipes exhibited values of 1910 W/m²K and 1805 W/m²K, respectively. Similarly, the helical pipe showed the lowest skin friction coefficient, with a value of 2.02 at Re = 5000, compared to 2.61 for the corrugated pipe. It has been observed that the heat transfer coefficient and the skin friction coefficient increased with the increase in Reynolds number. The wall temperature distributions on each pipe geometry for laminar and turbulent flow conditions have been obtained and analyzed. When the results were examined, it was determined that the highest heat transfer values were obtained in the helical pipe geometry at all Reynolds numbers, while the highest skin friction coefficient was observed in the corrugated pipe geometry.
KEYWORDS
heat transfer, Reynolds number, dimpled, corrugated, helical
PAPER SUBMITTED: 2025-01-05
PAPER REVISED: 2025-03-03
PAPER ACCEPTED: 2025-03-04
PUBLISHED ONLINE: 2025-04-05
DOI REFERENCE: https://doi.org/10.2298/TSCI250105076K
CITATION EXPORT: view in browser or download as text file
THERMAL SCIENCE YEAR 2025, VOLUME 29, ISSUE No. 5, PAGES [4043 - 4053]
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The CFD investigation on heat transfer performance of different pipe geometries at various Reynolds numbers

© 2026 Society of Thermal Engineers of Serbia. Published by the Vinča Institute of Nuclear Sciences, National Institute of the Republic of Serbia, Belgrade, Serbia. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International licence