An experimental investigation of the melting process in a rectangular enclosure

An experimental investigation of the melting process in the vicinity of a heated vertical wall in a rectangular enclosure is presented in this work. A flat-plate heat pipe was used to provide a uniform temperature source. The liquid flow patterns during the melting process were captured and the instantaneous marching of the liquid-solid interface was presented. In addition, the temperature distributions in the phase change material were measured at the mid-plane as well as top and bottom walls of the enclosure. Three different heat transfer regimes were identified during the melting process. The parametric domain covered the range of Ra=2.02 x 10⁶-2.61 x 10⁷, Ste Fo=0.001-0.125 and Pr=804-1055 while the critical Rayleigh number where the transition from the conduction to the convection regime occurs was found to be in the range of 7.869 x 10⁶-3.237 x 10⁷. It was found that the melt volume fraction and the time-averaged Nusselt number can be correlated by: V/V(o)=4.73Fo^0.906 Ste^1.538 Ra^0.002 and Nu=0.0219Ra^0.387 Pr^0.0191(H/δ)^0.0621 respectively.