Comparative Study of Air Performance of Fully Ducted Damper for HVAC based on Different Blade Profiles

Abstract

Volume control damper is a device for controlling and regulating the airflow into an indoor atmosphere and is one of the different fittings in a Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning system. Airfoil damper blade is a best suited blade among the different damper blades in use, viz. airfoil, triple-V and flat. A comparative air performance analysis was done between same thickness blades, one is conventional airfoil and NACA0010, other being reduced thickness of airfoil shape of conventional airfoil and NACA0006 for different air velocities. Computational Fluid Dynamics analysis of all four cases were done in Ansys software as per American National Standards Institute and Air Movement and Control Association Standard 500D configuration 5.3. Pressure drop from conventional airfoil was compared with the data available in the American Society of Heating Refrigerating and Air-conditioning Engineers duct fitting database for different air velocities. From the analysis of four different airfoil profile, it was found out that 4-digit NACA0010 airfoil has least pressure drop of all, and hence is the best suited profile for the damper among the damper profiles considered in the analysis. Also, superiority of 4-digits NACA airfoil profile is observed to that of conventional airfoil with respect to their total pressure drop.