Coupled natural convection heat transfer inside and outside a closed cylindrical cavity with a uniform temperature heat source

In order to understand the influences of Rayleigh number, geometric dimensions of closed cylindrical cavity and cylindrical heat source, the coupled natural convection inside and outside a closed cylindrical cavity with a uniform temperature heat source in the center of the cavity is simulated. The results indicate that the secondary vortex will appear in the closed cavity with the increasing dimensionless height of the internal heat source and the aspect ratio of the closed cavity. The heat transfer ability of the coupled natural convection reduces with the increasing dimensionless height and the radius of the heat source, and the decreasing the aspect ratio of the closed cavity. Compared with the results in an isothermal closed cavity, the heat transfer ability exhibits a different variation. Eventually, a heat transfer correlation on the heat exchange between the internal heat source and the external environment is obtained, which can be used as a reference for the heat dissipation calculation of electronic devices.