Shell and tube type heat exchanger

Shell and tube type heat exchanger

Introduction

Shell and tube type heat exchangers can be found in many industries. This type of heat exchanger, along with the plate type heat exchanger (PHE), are the most common heat exchangers used in the industrial engineering world today.

Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger Parts

A shell and tube heat exchanger consists of a series of tubes housed within a cylindrical container known as a ‘shell’. All tubes within the shell are collectively termed a ‘tube bundle’ or ‘tube stack’. Each tube passes through a series of baffles and one or more tubesheets. Normally, one of the tubesheets is fixed and one is free to move, this allows for thermal expansion as the heat exchanger temperature changes.

How Shell and Tube Heat Exchangers Work

The flowing medium within the tubes is known as the ‘tube side’ medium. The flowing medium outside of the tubes is known as the ‘shell side’ medium. Each medium has one entry and one discharge.

The tube side fluid flows through the tubes and has turbulent flow due to the turbulators. The shell side fluid has turbulent flow due to the baffles. As the shell and tube side fluids flow through the heat exchanger, they are brought into close physical contact with each other. Close physical contact allows them to exchange heat, because they have thermal contact with each other. Heat is exchanged with one fluid becoming cooler and the other becoming warmer.

Published by Science tube 16 September 2020