You can find here short news items about the Society.  This includes reports on recent events like Forums.  Since the Society is run by volunteers, we rely mostly on people to send us news items.  In particular, presenters of Forums are asked to contribute a short note on their presentation and/or a copy of the PowerPoint handouts.  For ease of loading such information on the web site, we have to lay down strict guidelines for these contributions.  Click here for these guidelines.

London Forum - Tuesday 23 September

Colin Weil and Simon Earland gave a comprehensive presentation on developments in Standards for heat transfer equipment and the Pressure Equipment Directive.  They have produced a paper covering the topic which can be downloaded as a pdf file by clicking here (36 kb).

Annual Dinner - 2007

The Annual Dinner was held  on Friday 30 March at New Connaught Rooms, WC2.  The main event of the evening was that John Rose, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Queen Mary, University of London, was installed as our president for 2007/08.

This lively evening was well attended with 144 members and guests on 14 tables.  Ten past presidents were at the event.

The Mike Ackrill Award went to Luc-Stéphane Schroeder of Chromalox International for his talk on, "Impedance Heating Heating and Melting using TPC Technology," given in London on 21 November 2006.

The Charity Raffle raised 712 pounds for The Cancer Treatment and Research Trust.  The raffle prizes were donated by HTFS/AspenTech.

Annual Dinner - 2005

This year's dinner was held a little earlier than usual because of the early Easter.  It was attended by 143 people.  The raffle raised £535 for the NSPCC from prizes kindly donated by Cal Gavin.

Alan Deakin of BP was inaugurated as our President for 2005/6.  Derek Jackson of the University of Manchester received the Mike Ackril Award and Eddie Watters was made a Fellow of the Society.

The President's Address, October 2004
Is Heat Transfer Good for You?

David Reay gave a wide-ranging talk to HTS members, and some invited from HEXAG and PIN, covering the areas of heat transfer which can affect, positively or adversely, our ability to function at work or play.

He started with a number of observations that 'set the scene' for the scope of his talk:

• Heat transfer has a major influence on our comfort and/or performance
• It affects the behaviour of every-day tools such as lap-top computers
• It is critical to the successful operation of most industries
• It allows us to produce edible hot food and 'quaffable' cold wine!
• Most of us here are involved in 'managing' heat transfer, either to increase its effectiveness or to minimise it
• But we perhaps do not stop to think: 'Is (effective) heat transfer good for us?'

Human comfort depends upon many factors, and David described the role of 'active' and 'resting' sweat glands and the ways in which they function. Could we influence human thermoregulation in a way that could minimise our need for space heating and cooling? Or can we design clothes that mimic thermoregulation - a new form of wool which opens and closes like pine needles to trap or expel heat is one answer!

Vapour bubbles exuding from human sweat glands

The benefits of heat exchangers can be realised to a greater extent when they are combined with other process unit operations. The chemical and process industries in general are already benefiting from 'process intensification' - making plant much more compact without sacrificing throughput. Taking as an example the Chart Heat Exchangers 'HEX-reactor', David showed how catalytic reactions and heat transfer could be beneficially combined in structures that resembled compact heat exchangers. Such technology could even lead to the 'gas turbine reactor', where the combined production of heat, power and chemicals would be carried out.

Chart Heat Exchangers 'HEX-reactor'

A theme throughout the talk was the heat pipe, which has interested David for most of his working life. As well as mimicking 'resting' sweat glands, they can be used to cool aircraft brakes, isothermalise space satellites, and cook meat. The 'heat pipe cooking pin' allows you to cook roast beef so that one half is rare and the other half well-done - in the words of the manufacturer "Stick it halfway in and individual tastes are satisfied.

Heat pipe cooking pin

In conclusion, David said: "We will soon have to take our jackets off, wear wool vests full of spikes, sit at 'hot' or even 'cold' desks and eat food which looks like Swiss cheese! - (full of holes for cooking pins)".

Global warming was the subject of much of the discussion, after all it may well influence our future heat transfer activities in a massive way. However, there were some sceptics present! For example; "Are our data, which shows a steady rise in global temperatures, influenced by measurements being made in 'warm' city environs?" A question for the Prime Minister as he addresses our greatest threat, perhaps?

The Wonders of Multistream Heat Exchangers

Dave Butterworth became interested in multistream exchangers after becoming Chairman and General Secretary of the Aluminium Plate-fin Heat Exchanger Manufacturers' Association (ALPEMA).  He gave a Forum presentation on 20 April at which he explained the some of the intricacies in the construction of such equipment and the benefits that they can have.

Multistream exchangers can be of two types

• Those in which, at any point in the exchanger, the heat transfer is only between one hot stream and one cold stream. We should call these 'multi-two-stream' exchangers
• Those in which at places in the exchanger, heat can be exchanged between a number of hot and cold streams.

Dave concentrated on the latter type with the aim of the talk of introducing those familiar with two-stream exchangers to the exciting feature of multistream exchangers.

Process Heat Transfer 2010

At the London Forum on 25 September, Dave Butterworth reviewed the developments in various aspects of process heat transfer from 1960s until today and then suggest how things might be in 2010.

Interrelated topics covered included the developments in software, availability of heat transfer expertise and the evolution of heat exchanger types. For the most part, it was suggested that the changes will be modest.

The suggested developments are the personal views of Dave rather than a consensus view of the industry. So the Dave's suggestions prompted a discussion from the audience including apposing viewpoints.

This presentation was a repeat of a Keynote lecture given at the 8th UK National Heat Transfer Conference Oxford, 9-10 September 2003.  The paper has now been published in Applied Thermal Engineering, Vol. 24, No. 8-9, June 2004, pp. 1395-1407.

Experience with PED

David Norton of Hunt Thermal led a discussion on a fabricators experiences with the European Pressurised Equipment Directive on 19 June in London.

Archie Reid

It is with great sadness that we announce the death of Archie Reid on 10 May 2003.  Archie was one of the founder members of the Heat Transfer Society with Membership No. 3.  When the Society was formed on 23 October 1964, Archie was appointed Treasurer, a post held for 10 years. In 1972, a London & South East Section of the Society was formed, for which Archie was appointed Chairman until the section was absorbed back in to the main Society 8 years later. Archie was an Auditor of the Society for 20 years, a post which he held up to the end.

In recognition of of his great service to the Society, he was made our President for 1992/3 and is one of the few people who are honourd as a Fellow of the Society.

He was a mentor to many in the industry and will be greatly missed.

London forum an why some heat exchangers fail to work, 22 May 2003

He also suggested ways in which the current heat-exchanger software could be adapted to iron out some of these problems at the design sage.

The presentation provoked a members of the audience to share their experiences with problem heat exchangers.

London forum on compact heat exchangers, 8 April 2003

In collaboration with SONG

This lively and well-attended event was done in collaboration with SONG (IChemE Oil and Natural Gas Subject Group).  There were three presentations

• An overview of compact heat exchangers by Vishwas Wadekar, HTFS

• A presentation of research done by Hans Zettler, HTRI, on modeling and fouling in plate heat exchangers

• A review of the use of PCHEs by Colin Grady of Heatric.

Information on two out of the three presentation are given below

Compact Heat Exchangers - An Overview

Vishwas Wadekar, Research Manager at HTFS, began by asking why compact heat exchangers might be considered in preference to more conventional shell-and-tube heat exchangers. For a given duty these exchangers provided smaller, more compact designs leading to significant savings in exchanger volume, footprint and weight, and additionally they could handle duties with close temperature approach. Their ability to handle close temperature approach was due to their high thermal effectiveness.

Vishwas Wadekar

Vishwas described how various heat exchangers could be classified based on the flow channel size and heat transfer area density within the heat exchanger. A wide variety of compact exchanger types, ranging from plate heat exchanger through plate-fin heat exchanger to printed circuit heat exchanger were covered in terms of their pressure and temperature limits. Given a wide variety of heat exchangers available, heat exchanger selection was a very important issue. After briefly covering the principles behind the heat exchanger selection, it was noted that a good computer program, incorporating a wide database on a variety of heat exchangers was a preferred option for the selection process.

Finally, Vishwas touched on the subject of plate-fin heat exchangers and their multistream capability. The effective use of the multistream capability was illustrated by taking an example from the LNG industry. Plate-fin heat exchangers could be modelled at various levels of rigour by using the HTFS program for plate-fin heat exchangers.

The presentation was very well received and resulted in a great deal of discussion. A number of advantages of compact heat exchangers were further highlighted in the discussion. For example, the ability to handle small temperature differences was very important to reduce the overall heating and cooling requirements in a process plant design. Smaller and light weight compact heat exchangers would also have a significant impact on reducing the installation costs; this was particularly important for the offshore applications.

Plate heat exchangers modelling and fouling

Hans Zettler talked about his PhD research work and this is illustrated by the following abstract to on of his papers.

The flow pattern of water in a corrugated heat exchanger channel has been investigated using the non-invasive technique of Positron Emission Particle Tracking (PEPT) in a plate heat exchanger (PHE). PEPT allows an individual neutrally buoyant particle moving at speeds of up to 10m/s to be tracked in three dimensions to within 1mm or less. The technique produces particle trajectories and velocity profiles, and has also been used to detect low flow velocity and re-circulation zones in the flow channel. In addition, it allows for the determination of residence time distributions over a variety of flow rates, plate corrugation angles, and plate set-ups (side- and diagonal flow). PEPT data obtained at the University of Birmingham is compared to data obtained by visual observation and fouling experiments obtained at the University of Surrey, to identify how different flow paths influence the fouling behaviour in a PHE.

Annual Dinner, 28 March 2003

The 39th Annual Dinner held at the New Connaught Rooms in London was a great success and was attended by 144 people.

After Chairman George Bowes briefly described events of the past year, outgoing President Mike Moore inaugurated Bob Marsland as President for 2003/04. Bob made a short speech and toasted the Guests.  Claudette Beyer responded on behalf of the guests and toasted the Members.

The Mike Ackrill Trophy was awarded to Robert Ashe and Richard Barker of Ashe Morris for their Forum presentation on "New Areas in Heat Transfer".

Jeff Neviile, a past president was made a Fellow and Life Member for his services to the Society and the heat-transfer industry.

The raffle raised £ 491 in aid of The Primary Club which supports blind and partially-sighted cricketers.  This charity was chosen in memory of Bob Berryman, long time Society Member, who sadly died early this year.

AGM, 6 March 2003

At the AGM, Mike Moore and Dave Gibbons were elected on to the Committee to replace the late, and sadly missed, Bob Berryman and to replace Gareth Fry who has moved jobs and is no longer involved in heat transfer. Dave Evans was elected a Trustee to replace Alan McKerracher who has move abroad.  Robert Ashe, the director of Ashe Morris, was chosen to receive this year's Mike Ackrill Award for his forum presentation entitled New areas in Heat Transfer presented on 17 September 2002.

Dave Evans, elected Society Trustee

From left to right, Simon Earland, Treasurer, George Bowes, Chairman and Colin Weil, Secretery.

Click here to view the minutes of last year's AGM as a pdf file.

Forum Evening, Tuesday 11 February 2003

"…fundamental instruction in heat transfer while employing the methods and language of industry"

"Considerable thought has been given to methods, and the author discussed them with numerous engineers before including them in the text."

"…some degree of accuracy has been sacrificed to permit the broader application of fewer methods, and it is hoped that these simplifications will cause neither inconvenience nor criticism."

David then argued that modern software should be able to exceed Kern, if only because the restrictions he describes can be removed. Hence, comparison with Kern as the "right answer" is not helpful, since it is certain that modern calculation algorithms should be better and more applicable.

However, what Kern gives is a sound reference. It is a means to help answer the question "is the result from software reasonable?".

David demonstrated briefly process simulators (HYSYS and Aspen Plus), heat exchanger software (HTFS TASC, HTFS ACOL, HTFS MUSE and Aspen Hetran) and mechanical software (HTFS TASC and Aspen Teams). He showed how these programs are easy to use both standalone or using software links between them.

David’s conclusion - a need for engineers knowledgeable on the principles of Kern, who use the modern software to it’s limits. The knowledge from Kern should be there to stop and question the answers the software supplies.

A long, and lively, discussion followed particularly debating the merits of the right answer (whatever that is!!) versus a consistent answer.

President's night, 24 October 2002

Mike Moore, Chief Mechanical Engineer of John Brown Hydrocarbons Limited is this year’s President of the Heat Transfer Society joining a list of well respected past presidents. John Brown Hydrocarbons Limited hosted this year's event in Paddington and for this Mike chose to expand on the theme of his inaugural speech entitled "A Brief History of Heat."

Mike gave an overview of heat transfer from the first taming of fire (half a million years ago) including baking (Circa 20,000BC), Pottery (~6,500 BC), metalworking (~2,000BC) and distillation of rice beer to make sake (~800BC). Into the modern era, the first steam machine was Hero’s Aeolipile in the first century AD), distillation of alcohol in Europe (~AD 1,000), steam power (17th century onwards) and oil distillation (19th century) and so through to the present day.

"We can feel heat, see its effects and use its properties - but what is it?  As a form of energy, it has helped to shape our world, our environment and our civilisation. Man has harnessed heat for both good and evil, but can he compete with nature in the awesome effects of heat?"

The talk included descriptions of the nature of heat itself in scientific terms and the main sources of heat that effect us (the Earth and the Sun). Mike gave an expanded version of the history of the use of heat as an energy source. In describing the development of technologies to utilise this energy, a general theme emerged that the developments and the applications of technology have always been built on existing technology and that no successful development is produced in isolation. Finally, Mike considered our current use of heat and the possible effects on our environment

The presentation was very well received and prompted a wide ranging discussion with particular emphasis on environmental issues that had been raised both directly and indirectly from the talk.

George Bowes, the Chairman of the Heat transfer Society, concluded the evening with thanks to John Brown Hydrocarbons Limited for the hospitality, and to Mike for a talk that was topical, thought provoking and which was of interest to all those present.

This article is an edited version of one written by Dave Richardson which appeared in the John Brown House Magazine, The Bear

Mike More giving his President's Night address