2007 Volume 24 Issue 4 Pages 431-437
The mist formation is found occasionally at the outlet of the air-conditioner, especially in the high temperature and high humidity environment. When the condensation takes place, a certain degree of the super-saturation is needed. Some researchers introduced the critical saturation model1-3) into the condensation process concerning with the super-saturation. However, under the ordinary environmental conditions where air-conditioners are installed, there are many nuclei for the phase change such as dusts in the humid air. They may offer the trigger to condense; that is to form the mist. In this research, with taking into account the super-saturation depending on the diameter of foreign nucleus, the mist formation is numerically predicted by solving boundary layer equations for the cold parallel plate channel simulating the heat exchanger of air-conditioner with the slit fins. The effects of the humidity and channel dimension on the mist formation rate and on heat and mass transfer are investigated. In addition, the numerical results are compared with those for the plate channel reported previously.
