Experimental study of laminar flow heat transfer with prescribed wall heat flux

Laminar‐flow heat transfer in a cylindrical tube was studied experimentally in order to test a recent analytical method of predicting temperature profiles (1). The experimental equipment was designed to measure wall temperatures to better than 0.1°C. and to utilize small radial heat fluxes so as to minimize effects of natural convection. A series of experiments was carried out on five different types of prescribed wall heat flux with water flowing in a vertical tube. The measured wall temperatures in these experiments compared well with those predicted by the theoretical solution. Small deviations which did exist were explained in terms of experimental errors. The agreement found indicates that the analytical method may be safely used in the study of experimental data in such heat transfer and analogous mass transfer problems.