🏗️ Industrial Heat Exchanger Sizing & Sizing Area
Size shell-and-tube or double-pipe heat exchangers for industrial cooling, process heating, and HVAC applications.
Design Sizing Overview
In process plants and mechanical design, sizing a heat exchanger requires calculating the required thermal heat transfer area ($A$) based on fluid temperatures, mass flow rates, and specific heat capacities. Designers must also account for **fouling factors** over time, which degrade performance and require excess surface margin.
This page connects you to our advanced heat exchanger solvers, allowing you to run evaluations using either the **LMTD (Log Mean Temperature Difference)** method for sizing or the **$\varepsilon$-NTU (Effectiveness-NTU)** method for performance rating.
🏗️ Double-Pipe Design & Sizing
Size double-pipe heat exchangers with pre-loaded values for cooling process oil with cooling water, complete with fouling resistance inputs.
Launch Double-Pipe Sizing Tool →🏢 Shell-and-Tube Pass Sizing
Analyze multi-shell and tube passes, calculate LMTD correction factors ($F$), and verify temperature cross margins.
Launch Shell-and-Tube Calculator →Thermal Sizing Formulations
1. Heat Duty Equation ($Q$)
$$Q = \dot{m}_h C_{p,h} (T_{hi} - T_{ho}) = \dot{m}_c C_{p,c} (T_{co} - T_{ci})$$2. Log Mean Temperature Difference (LMTD)
$$\Delta T_{lm} = \frac{\Delta T_1 - \Delta T_2}{\ln(\Delta T_1 / \Delta T_2)}$$Where for counter-flow: $\Delta T_1 = T_{hi} - T_{co}$ and $\Delta T_2 = T_{ho} - T_{ci}$.
3. Overall Heat Transfer Coefficient ($U$) with Fouling
The total thermal resistance includes inner/outer film coefficients and wall fouling resistances ($R_{f,i}$, $R_{f,o}$):
$$\frac{1}{U_o} = \frac{A_o}{A_i h_i} + \frac{A_o R_{f,i}}{A_i} + \frac{A_o \ln(r_o/r_i)}{2\pi k L} + R_{f,o} + \frac{1}{h_o}$$4. Required Surface Area ($A$)
$$A = \frac{Q}{U \cdot F \cdot \Delta T_{lm}}$$Where $F$ is the multi-shell/tube flow configuration correction factor ($F \le 1.0$).