Heat Exchanger Shellside Pressure Drop: Comparison of Predictions With Experimental Data

A unique set of heat exchanger shellside pressure drop experimental data has become available from experiments at Argonne National Laboratory as a part of an ongoing research program in flow-induced vibration. These data provide overall pressure drop for a number of typical industrial heat exchanger configurations in addition to incremental pressure drop measurements along the shellside path. The test program systematically varied the baffle spacing, the tubefield pattern, and nozzle size for a series of isothermal water tests for segmentally baffled bundles. Also recently a comprehensive method has been published in the Heat Exchanger Design Handbook (HEDH) for the prediction of bundle shellside pressure drops. A search of the literature failed to reveal a complementary method for predicting the shellside nozzle pressure losses. This paper compares the predicted with the measured data and validates the adequacy and limitations of the HEDH method for full bundles of plain tubes. It further applies an extension to the method for no-tubes-in-the-window bundles. Adjustments were indicated to improve the predictions for finned tubes and methods were developed to predict shellside nozzle pressure drops. Overall pressure drop predictions were within plus or minus 20 percent.