DESTHEx, Versin 1.

0
DEsign of Shell-and-Tube Heat Exchangers

Medardo Serna
a
, Jos M. Ponce
a
and Arturo Jimnez
b

a
Facultad de Ingeniera Qumica, Universidad Michoacana de San Nicols de Hidalgo,
58060, Morelia, Mich. Mxico
b
Departamento de Ingeniera Qumica, Instituto Tecnolgico de Celaya,
38010, Celaya, Gto. Mxico


Welcome to version 1.0 of DESTHEx (DEsign of Shell-and-Tube Heat Exchangers).
This software package can be used to design shell-and-tube heat exchangers. The program has
been written in C++and runs on a PC with Windows 2000. It uses important features supplied
by Windows, such as mouse control, pushbuttons and input boxes.

Design Problem

As indicated by J egede and Polley (1992), it is convenient to formulate an algorithm
for designing shell and tube heat exchangers that ensures that the pressure drops within the
exchanger are equal to the specified values of the allowable pressure drops for both streams;
meeting this condition provides the smallest exchanger area for a given duty. Based on this
principle, Serna and J imnez (2004) developed simple analytical expressions that relate the
fluid pressure drop, the exchanger area and the film heat transfer coefficient for both tube-side
and shell-side streams. The shell-side expression has been derived based on the Bell-
Delaware method (Taborek, 1983) and does not contain any simplification or approximation;
thus, this equation has the same accuracy as the full Bell-Delaware method and can be used
under the entire range of geometric parameters of interest. For the tube side of the exchanger,
the compact formulation for the pressure drop accounts for both straight pressure drop and
return losses in a simple manner. These formulations replace the use of the approximate Kern
method (1950) for the shell-side stream, and overcome certain simplifying assumptions made
in previous works (J egede y Polley, 1992; Polley et al., 1990). The compact expressions
provide the basis for the simple and accurate design algorithm of single-phase shell-and-tube
heat exchangers in steady state described in the work by Serna and J imnez (2004).
The proposed design approach, nonetheless, still requires a significant amount of
numerical calculations to obtain the geometric parameters and the size of a shell and tube heat
exchanger for a given set of specifications. The computer code implements a design algorithm
that is independent of the nature of the hot and cold fluids to be processed and of the
geometric data for the system. With such package, students or practicing engineers should be
able to readily solve a shell-and-tube heat exchanger design problem, giving more attention to
the design problem instead of dealing themselves with extensive numerical calculations.
DESTHEx is the software package that implements the design algorithm developed by
Serna and J imnez (2004). The package has been found simple to use and generally provides
fast and accurate results.


General Software Overview

Installing DESTHEx on a Hard Disk
The DESTHEX.ZIP program, which is downloaded through the Internet from the
website http://posgrado.fiq.umich.mx/~division/pag6.html, creates the DESTHEX
subdirectory on a hard disk when it is decompressed.
The DESTHEX subdirectory will contain:
DESTHEX.EXE Compiled program that performs shell-and-tube heat exchanger design
calculations
EX1.DAT Example file of a design problem reported by Serna and J imnez
(2004)

Getting Started
The program can be run from Windows by double clicking from the File Manager or
Explorer.
As the DESTHEx program is initially executed, the main window shown in Figure 1
will appear. This is a simple user interface that aids the use of the program. The main window
is separated into three different sections as shown in Figure 1. In the top section, the user can
provide the input data for design. The medium section shows the data output or results. The
bottom section contains four pushbuttons: EXTRACT DATA, SAVE DATA,
EXECUTE PROGRAM, and EXIT.
The variables of the main window are listed in Table 1.



Figure 1. User-friendly interface.

Table 1
Variables of DESTHEx window and description.
Variable Description
ASHELL Maximum allowable area per shell
BC Baffle cut as percent of inside shell diameter
DI Inside tube diameter
DO Tube outside diameter
FTMIN The F
T
minimum correction factor for multipass heat exchangers. A lower
bound on the F
T
correction factor of 0.80 is considered by the program to
ensure practical designs, unless another value is set by the user (in that
case, a F
T
value grater than 0.75 is suggested)
IHAZ Integer in {1,,4} that specifies which type of tube bundle construction
is to be used: 1. Fixed tubesheet; 2. Packed floating-head bundle; 3. Split-
ring floating-head bundle; and 4. Pull-through floating-head bundle.
LAYOUT Integer in {1,,3} which specifies which tube layout characteristic angle
is to be used: 1. Triangular 30; 2. Square 90; 3. Square 45.
LBB Inside shell-to-tube bundle bypass clearance (diametral)
LBS Inside shell-to-baffle clearance (diametral)
LPL Tube lane partition bypass width
LTB Tube outside diameter-to-baffle hole clearance (diametral)
LTP Tube layout pitch
LTS Tubesheet thickness
NPASS Number of tube passes
NSS Number of sealing strips (pairs)
RLI Ratio of inlet baffle spacing to central baffle spacing
RLO Ratio of outlet baffle spacing to central baffle spacing


Input Data
In the Input Data section the following parameters have to be set.
Process Data: mass flow rate, allowable pressure drop, inlet temperature, outlet
temperature and fouling resistance for both fluids.
Geometric Data: inside tube diameter, tube outside diameter, tube layout pitch, tube layout
characteristic angle, number of tube passes, minimum value of the F
T
correction factor,
baffle cut, number of sealing strips, shell-side clearances (optional)*, tubesheet thickness
(optional)*, tube lane partition bypass width (optional)
*
, and type of tube bundle
construction.
Physical Properties: viscosity, heat capacity, thermal conductivity and density of both
fluids, as well as the tube wall material thermal conductivity.

The values for the input parameters can be typed directly in the corresponding boxes
or loaded from a data file created by DESTHEx. When this option is selected, the user should
type the name of the file to load in the left-top box, without including the file extension DAT;
then the EXTRACT DATA button must be used for loading the desired DESTHEx data file
from the disk.
If any existing Input Data has to be saved, the user must type a name to use for the
data file in the left-top box; then, by clicking the SAVE DATA button, the current Input
Data is saved in a DESTHEx file on disk.


*
These variables may be specified by the user or calculated by the program. The calculated values of tube-to-
baffle clearance, shell-to-baffle clearance, shell-to-bundle clearance, tubesheet thickness, and tube lane partition
width are those recommended by Taborek (1983).

Figure 2. Output Data screen.

Output Data
When the necessary input data are provided, the program can be run by clicking the
EXECUTE PROGRAM button. The summarized results from the program will then appear
in the medium section of the main window. A detailed output data for the EX1.DAT data file
is shown in Figure 2, which includes:
Geometric Data: inside shell diameter, overall nominal tube length, effective tube length
for heat transfer area, central baffle spacing, inlet baffle spacing, outlet baffle spacing, total
number of tubes, number of baffles, and total heat transfer area.
Process Information: heat duty, logarithmic mean temperature difference, corrected mean
temperature difference, correction factor for logarithmic mean temperature difference for
non-countercurrent flow (optional), shell-side heat transfer coefficient, tube-side heat
transfer coefficient, shell-side flow velocity, tube-side flow velocity, shell-side Reynolds
number, tube-side Reynolds number, shell-side Prandtl number, and tube-side Prandtl
number
One can easily change some input parameters after each program execution. This is
done by filling out the corresponding boxes in the Input Data section with the desired values
of input parameters. Care must be taken, however, to supply data or changes that match the
energy balance for each stream of the exchanger.

References

J egede, F.O. and Polley, G.T., 1992, Optimum heat exhanger design, Trans IChemE Part A,
70: 133.
Kern, D.Q., 1950, Process heat transfer, McGraw-Hill.
Polley, G.T., Panjeh Shahi, M.H. and J egede, F.O., 1990, Pressure drop considerations in the
retrofit of heat exchanger networks, Trans IChemE Part A, 68: 211.
Serna, M. and J imnez, A., 2005, A compact formulation of the Bell-Delaware method for
heat exchanger design and optimization, to appear in Trans IChemE Part A.
Taborek, J ., 1983, Shell-and-tube exchangers: Single-phase flow, in: E. U. Schlunder (Ed.),
Heat exchangers design handbook, Vol. 3, Section 3.3, Hemisphere Publishing Corp.