Waste Heat Recovery by Heat Pipe Air-Preheater to Energy Thrift from the Furnace in a Hot Forging Process

Problem statement: Currently, the heat pipe air-preheater has become importance equipment for energy recovery from industrial waste heat because of its low investment cost and high thermal conductivity. Approach: This purpose of the study was to design, construct and test the waste heat recovery by heat pipe air-preheater from the furnace in a hot brass forging process. The mathematical model was developed to predict heat transfer rate and applied to compute the heat pipe air-preheater in a hot brass forging process. The heat pipe air-preheater was designed, constructed and tested under medium temperature operating conditions with inlet hot gas ranging between 370-420°C using water as the working fluid with 50% filling by volume of evaporator length. Results: The experiment findings indicated that when the hot gas temperature increased, the heat transfer rate also increased. If the internal diameter increased, the heat transfer rate increased and when the tube arrangement changed from inline to staggered arrangement, the heat transfer rate increased. Conclusion/Recommendations: The heat pipe air-preheater can reduced the quantity of using gas in the furnace and achieve energy thrift effectively.