FORCED-CONVECTION AND FLOW BOILING HEAT-TRANSFER FOR LIQUID FLOWING THROUGH MICROCHANNELS

Experiments were conducted to investigate the single-phase forced-flow convection and boiling characteristics of subcooled liquid flowing through microchannels with a cross-section of 0.6 x 0.7 mm, machined on the stainless steel plate 2 mm thick. The influences of liquid velocity and subcooling on the boiling curve were experimentally inspected. It was observed that a steep increase of q'' emerged on the single-phase convection q''- T(w) curve. The experiments indicated that the single-phase convection and flow boiling characteristics are quite different from those in normally sized tubes, and their heat transfer was intensified. No apparent partial nucleate boiling exists for subcooled flow boiling, i.e. fully-developed boiling was induced much earlier in microchannels.