HEAT TRANSFER AND LABORATORY - 2023/4

Module Overview

Heat Transfer: Knowledge of heat transfer is vital for Chemical Engineers. In order to effectively design and operate many unit operations, such as heat exchangers and reactors, a sound understanding of the fundamentals of heat transfer is required. This part of the module is intended to introduce students to the basic mechanisms of heat transfer and to allow them to apply this understanding to the design of heat exchangers.

The laboratory element extends upon the skills developed in FHEQ Level 4 of the degree programmes, with particular attention to investigations that demonstrate and reinforce concepts of several FHEQ Level 5 modules.

Module provider

Chemistry and Chemical Engineering

Module Leader

LEE Judy (Chst Chm Eng)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 5

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

None

Module content

Indicative content includes:

Heat Transfer

Introduction to Heat Transfer

• Temperature driving force


• Setting up and solving simple transient problems

• Log mean temperature concept - parallel and cross flow


• Heat capacity rates, NTU, heat exchanger efficiency


• Correction factor method


• Overall and film heat transfer coefficients, fouling.


• Concept of thermal resistance and electrical analogue

• Steady state heat conduction, Fourier’s law


• Conduction through cylindrical layers, critical lagging thickness


• Convection mechanisms, boundary layer theory


• Unconfined and confined flow. Entrance lengths


• Dimensionless numbers and HTC correlations


• Pipe flow – constant surface temperature and constant heat flux


• Radiation - mechanisms, total enclosure, basic radiation exchange calculations

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

N/A 

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate successful attainment of the full range of learning outcomes covered in lectures and practised in tutorial classes. Where appropriate, the assessments will reflect industrially relevant systems.

 Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:

• Coursework (Laboratory) - 35%, comprising of: a Full Investigation Report (15%), a Short Investigation Report (8%) and 3 Results and Executive Summary Reports (3x4%), with the inclusion of additional dissemination elements such as verbal presentations and proposals for new operational / briefing guides. (LO5 – LO8)


• Examination – 65%, 2 hours (LO1 – LO4)

• In-Semester Test (Heat Transfer) – Combination of questions addressing fundamental knowledge (LO1, LO2) with open ended design calculations (LO3)

• Weekly verbal feedback during tutorial classes (LO1 – LO4)


• Verbal feedback during optional drop-in tutorial classes (LO1 – LO4)


• Written feedback on Coursework with full worked solutions published on SurreyLearn (LO1 – LO4)


• Written and verbal feedback on Coursework (LO5 – LO8)


• Demonstrator feedback on equipment operational matters during the course of the laboratory work (LO5, LO6)

Module aims

• Familiarise students with the mechanisms of heat transfer and with the basic approach to solving steady state and transient heat transfer problems
• Teach performance and design calculation methods for a range of heat exchanger types.
• Introduce heat flux calculations for conduction, convection and radiation transfer mechanisms
• Analyse heat transfer in pipe flow
• Develop the practical skills necessary for problem solving, analysis, and technical dissemination through laboratory experimentation.
• Further underpin the many theoretical aspects of the degree programmes through practical experimentation.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to:

• Present the fundamental material in lectures in the context of industrially relevant examples


• Allow students to practice the techniques developed in lectures through extensive tutorial examples. The solution of these problems will involve both guided study in tutorial sessions and independent study.


• Provide the students with basic guidance on the laboratory task with the support resources to facilitate creative and critical thinking and an explorative approach to the work.


• Provide students with repetitive practice and feedback on report dissemination.

• Lectures 


• Tutorials 


• Laboratory work                    


• Guided work                         


• Independent learning 

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: ENG2121

Other information

The School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering is committed to developing graduates with strengths in Employability, Digital Capabilities, Global and Cultural Capabilities, Sustainability, and Resourcefulness and Resilience. This module is designed to allow students to develop knowledge, skills, and capabilities in the following areas  

Digital Capabilities: Through the module student will learn to navigate and utilise Virtual learning Environment (Surrey Learn), online databases and digital software to aid their learning and analysis of experimental data. 

Employability: This module enables students to develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills in calculating the transfer of heat in chemical processing context and analysis experimental data.  Students will be working in groups for their laboratory sessions where they will develop communication and group-working skills, and learn to manage their time to produce an engineering project.  These skills are critical when entering into industry as graduate engineers and are key transferrable skills sought by employers of all disciplines.

Global and Cultural Skills:  Students will work in small tutorial and lab groups with other students from different backgrounds to solve problems, build solutions and produce a laboratory engineering report.

Resourcefulness and resilience: This module consist of weekly tutorial sheet problems with increasing degree of difficulty. Full solutions are not provided, and students are expected to develop their own set of solutions through the guidance provided during the weekly tutorials.  This will enable students to reflect and learn from their own performances and experiences in problem solving challenging questions, develop confidence, and decision-making abilities through their understand of the module theory and applying it to real world problems.  Similarly, students are allocated in groups to carryout five different engineering experiments and collect the necessary data within the allocated laboratory time.  Students are assessed through different methods such as in-situ assessments, individual and group report.  This will enable students to develop resourcefulness and resilience to adapt assessment platforms.

Sustainability:  Students will learn the mechanism of heat transfer, which are key principals and knowledge behind understanding climate change and what contributes to global warming.  In the context of heat exchangers in industry, students will learn about design and performance of industrial heat exchangers and how they can be used to recover waste heat by using it to heat different process streams.   This practice would minimise the energy consumption and enable for sustainable operation.

Programmes this module appears in

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2023/4 academic year.