Heat Exchanger
Project Report
The heat exchanger design was inspired by a one-shell-pass shell and tube heat exchanger. Our design differs from the traditional version by having the hot and cold water flowing antiparallel instead of perpendicular.
This project taught me about how to maximize heat exchanger performance and manufacturing methods for copper tubing. I learned how to manually bend copper tubing as well as the limitations it has. One of the challenges this project provided was that our inexperience in this area limited our design. As my team and I did not understand and had not experienced the methods for bending and working with copper tubing, we decided to use a more simplistic design which was expected to be less effective, especially since we were limited in budget. Even then, our inexperience meant the bending results were suboptimal.
If I were to start this project again, I would apply my learnings to develop a more compact and effective heat exchanger. I would be able to manufacture more complex designs with the experience I gained previously. The key would be to fit more tubing as the longer distance provides more surface for heat to transfer through. This could be done for example by coiling the copper tubing instead of 90° and 180° bends.