Experimental Investigations on Thermal Conductivity and Performance Analysis of Filament Wound Fiber Reinforced Heat Exchanger Composite Shell

Advanced composites with their inherent advantages such as strength to weight ratio, became an ideal choice mostly in the fields like aerospace, missiles, submarines and ground structures like heavy military bridges etc. Composite materials also proved to be good insulators and have wide application in boiler tubes, heat exchanger shells and electrical applications. In any power plant apart from the turbine, boiler and pump, the heat exchanger is a vital component. The present investigation proposes EGlass/Vinyl Ester filament wound FRP (Fiber Reinforced Polymer) heat exchanger shell due to its good thermal insulation and noncorrosive properties. Experimental investigation was carried out to determine thermal conductivity on FRP shell. Based on these investigations, a single tube & shell type heat exchanger with copper as tube and FRP as shell is designed and developed in order to carryout performance analysis of a composite shell for both parallel and counter flows for a range of temperatures from 40 °C to 150 °C. The heat exchanger effectiveness for FRP shell is found to be 28% more than mild steel shell in the heat exchanger. The present study recommends that the existing metal boiler shells can be replaced with FRP material due low maintenance cost and less radiation effect.