Natural convection heat transfer from horizontal heated plates in an enclosure (Effects of interval of heated plates on flow characteristics)

In this paper, natural convection in an enclosure which two parallel heated plates are included is investigated experimentally. We consider the experimental model stated as follows : two heated plates arranged in the vertical direction : the surface of heated plates have constant heat flux : the temperature of ceiling is kept for cooling : the other sides have thermal insulation boundary condition. The relevance of the flow in the enclosure and the heat transfer characteristics from each heated surface was presented. In the area of between cooled ceiling and heated surface, vortex motion arises when the ascending flow from the upper plates and the accompanying flow to the rising flow from lower area are interfered. Heat transfer around heated surface is enhanced by the vortex motion. In the other areas, the flow is circulated along the heated surface, and average Nusselt number is proportional to modified Rayleigh number at the power in general.