Nanofluid as a coolant in automotive radiators

Abstract

Paper presented to the 10th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Florida, 14-16 July 2014.The present paper reports an experimental work on thermal performance of silver/water nanofluids in a radiator. Silver nanoparticles were dispersed in distilled water using the two-step method, high-pressure homogeneizer, with concentration varying from 0.1% and 0.3% in volume. The thermal conductivity and the viscosity were measured showing an enhancement up to 18% and 5%, respectively, in relation to the base fluid. An experimental facility was built for this purpose and tests have been conducted under the following conditions: inlet air temperature of 25oC, inlet hot fluid temperature of 45oC. The experimental results show similar results in the temperature difference of hot fluid for concentration of 0.3%, and nanofluid presented high heat transfer for the high velocities of the cooling air.