Analysis of Bend Radius and Inlet Pipe Position on Hydronic Radiant Underfloor Heating System
Date
2023-10
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
I.O.E. Pulchowk Campus
Abstract
A hydronic radiant underfloor heating system (RFHS) is a type of heating system that
utilizes water as the heat transfer medium to provide comfortable and efficient heating in
residential and commercial buildings. The rate of energy consumption on the household
level for heating and cooling is increasing annually. Meeting future heating and cooling
energy demand by alternative technology like floor heating systems (FHS) is a primary
concern for engineers and designers. FHS has the advantages of lower investment cost,
lower energy consumption, better thermal comfort, and maintaining the desired
temperature up to human height. This merit has encouraged many researchers to study
FHS in terms of temperature distribution, energy analysis, thermal analysis, and control
strategy throughout the world. This study aims to investigate the effect of bend radius and
change in the inlet position of pipe on temperature distribution over the floor surface for
different mass flow rates. The findings of this analysis will provide valuable insights into
the optimal bend radius, and temperature distribution which will provide improved design
Description
The offset serpentine layout exhibited a larger temperature drop on the floor surface
compared to the counterflow layout. A comparison of the two layouts showed that the
counterflow layout had lower pressure gradient and turbulent kinetic energy. The
temperature near the bend region was influenced on changing the bend radius. Increasing
the bend radius from 2mm to 30mm led to an increase in the temperature near the bend,
while for bend radii above 40mm, the temperature near the bend region slightly decreased
for a constant mass flow rate. Additionally, for the counterflow layout with change in
inlet position, with a mass flow rate of 0.23lps, the temperature at the outlet was slightly
higher, reaching 320K, and the overall temperature on the floor surface reached 310K.
Keywords
Radius,, Hydronic Radiant,, Inlet Pipe