Characteristics of boiling curve in transition region between nucleate boiling and film boiling

An experimental study has been carried out for estimating surface temperature and heat flux during both a transient heating process from nucleate boiling to film boiling and a cooling process in the reverse direction. Experiments were at atmospheric pressure, and calculations used a newly developed inverse solution. Three different materials, gold, copper, and brass, were employed to make clear the effect of thermal properties on the boiling curves in the transient region including the maximum and minimum heat fluxes. It was determined that the histories of surface temperature and heat flux for the transition boiling region during either heating or cooling process can be tracked well. The experiment shows that hysteresis exists in the heating and cooling processes for the transition region while no hysteresis exists in the nucleate boiling region, except that the maximum heat fluxes reached during the heating and cooling processes are much different. It was found that the characteristics for the heating process are minimally influenced by thermal properties, while characteristics of the cooling process are greatly affected. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res, 35(1): 20–34, 2006; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/htj.20097