Investigation of the Variation of Point Unit Heat-Transfer Coefficients for Laminar Flow Over an Inclined Flat Plate

Abstract

Many applications of heat-transfer phenomena by forced convection require a knowledge of heat transfer from simple geometric bodies like the flat plate. Investigations of the flat plate have been limited, in general, to studies of isothermal plates of 0-deg angle of incidence and in laminar flow. The amount of data concerning investigations on turbulent flow, nonisothermal plates or inclined plates is quite small. It is the intent of this paper to provide information on the heat transfer from a nonisothermal inclined flat plate in laminar flow. It is shown herein that forced-convection heat-transfer data for an inclined nonisothermal flat plate with a constant specific rate of heat flow can be correlated and represented by an equation of the type (1) Nu x Re L = C ( x L ) n for laminar flow. It is further shown that this equation is similar in slope to the theoretical equation of the type (2) Nu x Re L = C 2 ( x L ) m + 1 2 for an isothermal plate in laminar flow, but is larger by 30 per cent in absolute value. This variance can be partly explained by an analysis of the behavior of a nonisothermal plate as opposed to an isothermal one, but this analysis leaves much to be desired, so that the full explanation is at present unknown.