Control of fouling in a spirally-ribbed water chilled tube with electronicanti-fouling technology

The objective of the present study was to investigate the feasibility of us ing electronic anti-fouling (EAF) technology to control precipitation fouli ng in a spirally-ribbed tube commonly used in chillers. Fouling experiments were conducted with two new tubes: one with an EAF treatment and the other without it. Brush punching of a fouled tube with an enhanced spin-grit bru sh cleaned almost all of the scale above the fins for the case with the EAF treatment, thus recovering 90% of the initial overall heat transfer coeffi cient values. However, for the case without the EAF treatment, the spin-gri t brush punching was not effective in removing scale. The present experimen t indicated that the EAF technology could be used to control precipitation fouling in a spirally-ribbed tube. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All right s reserved.