Heat transfer to non-Newtonian flows over a cylinder in cross flow

Over a range of 102<Re^*<5800, 6.5<Pr^*<79, and 0.6<n<1, circumferential wall temperatures for water and aqueous polymer (purely viscous) solution flows over a smooth cylinder were measured experimentally. The cylinder was heated by passing direct electric current through it. Aqueous solutions of Carbopol 934 and EZ1 were used as power-law non-Newtonian fluids. The peripherally averaged heat transfer coefficient for purely viscous non-Newtonian fluids, at any fixed flow rate, decreases with increasing polymer concentration. A new correlation is proposed for predicting the peripherally averaged Nusselt number for power-law fluid flows over a heated cylinder in cross flow.