Heat transfer coefficient in ducts with constant wall temperature

An analytical method for the numerical calculation of the heat transfer coefficient in arbitrarily shaped ducts with constant wall temperature at the boundary is presented. The flow is considered to be laminar and fully developed, both thermally and hydrodynamically. The method presented herein makes use of Galerkin-type functions for computation of the Nusselt number. This method is applied to circular pipes and ducts with rectangular, isosceles triangular, and right triangular cross sections. A three-term or even a two-term solution yields accurate solutions for circular ducts. The situation is similar for right triangular ducts with two equal sides. However, for narrower ducts, a larger number of terms must be used.