LAUSR

This paper presents the results of numerical analysis of steady laminar natural convection and surface radiation in the two dimensional partially right side open square cavity filled with natural air (Pr = 0.70) as the fluid medium. The cavity has left isothermal hot wall with top, bottom and right adiabatic walls. In the present study, the governing equations i.e. Navier-Stokes Equation in the stream function – vorticity form and Energy Equation are solved for a constant thermophysical property fluid under the Boussinesq approximation. For discretization of these equations, the finite volume technique is used. For the radiation calculations, the radiosity-irradiation formulation is used and the shape factors is calculated by using the Hottel’s crossed-string method. The effects of openings having different dimensions at different positions in the right side wall with the other pertinent parameters like the Rayleigh Number (103 ≤ Ra ≤ 105) and the surface emissivity of walls (0.05 ≤ ε ≤ 0.85) are studied. Correlations are developed for the average convection Nusselt number and the average radiation Nusselt number at left isothermal hot wall for the different geometries of the cavity.