TABLE OF CONTENT

ABSTRACT........................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................3
OBJECTIVE........................................................................................................4
THEORY............................................................................................................5
PROCEDURE......................................................................................................8
RESULTS...........................................................................................................9
DISCUSSION....................................................................................................11
CONCLUSION..................................................................................................12
RECOMMENDATIONS.......................................................................................12
REFERENCES...................................................................................................13
APPENDICES...................................................................................................13

1 | Page

ABSTRACT

The experiment was led to explore the impact of air speed or velocity and water stream rate on
the wet bulb approach and to focus the differential weight through the pressing. Cooling towers
are heat evacuation gadgets used to exchange procedure waste heat to the climate and
environment. This investigation was finished with the reason to contemplate the heat and mass
transfer as well as the mass energy balance in a closed system.. In this trial, the water stream was
presented at the highest point of the cooling tower which then falls over through the pressing
materials and was presented to air. The packing material in the cooling tower was used to
increase the surface area of contact with water and to cool it to the atmosphere. During the
contact between gas-liquid interface, the water evaporates into the air stream. Here, latent heat of
evaporation was carried into the bulk of air by the water vapor. Besides that, the experiment also
were conducted to determine the power for the system. In this case, the blower and heater power
were used. At that point, keeping in mind the end goal to focus the framework's adequacy, the
water's temperatures and air entering and leaving were recorded to ascertain the thermodynamic
parity. The estimations taken are incorporate the psychometric data at the air passage and way
out. The temperatures of water stream rate were additionally recorded and making a speed profile
for the cooling tower fan. To wrap things up, through this examination, we had encountered to
utilize this hardware by hands on methodology. Cases for cooling tower utilized as a part of an
industry are aeration and cooling system, cooler, cooling tank in an industry and others.

INTRODUCTION

2 | Page

A cooling tower is designed to remove heat from a building or facility by spraying water down
through the tower to exchange heat into the inside of the building. Cooling towers are principally
utilized for warming, ventilation, and aerating and cooling (HVAC) and industrial uses. Cooling
towers give a financially savvy and vitality effective operation of frameworks needing cooling.
More than 1,500 mechanical offices utilize huge amounts of water to cool their plants. In cooling
tower concept there are water circuit and air circuit.
1. Water Circuit
Warm water is pumped from the load tank through the control valve and water flow meter to the
column cap. After its temperature is measured, the water is uniformly distributed over the top
packing deck and as it spreads over the plates, a large thin film of water is exposed to the air
stream. During its downward packaged through the packing, the water is cooled, largely by the
evaporation of a small portion of the total flow.
The cooled water flows from the lowest packing deck into the basin where the temperature is
again be measured and then passes into the load tank where it is reheated before recirculation.
Due to evaporation, the level of water in the load tank tends to fall. This causes the float operated
needle valve to open and transfer water from the make up tank into the load tank. Under steady
conditions, the rate at which the water leaves the make-up tank is equal to the rate of evaporation
plus any small airborne droplets in the air discharged.
2. Air Circuit
Air from the atmospheric enters the fan at a rate which is controlled by the admission damper
setting. The fan releases into the dispersion chamber and the air goes to wet and dry bulb sensors
(which the temperature t2 and t1 are measured) before entering the pressed segment. As the air
streams through the pressing, its dampness substance increments and the water is cooled. On
leaving the highest point of the segment or column, the air goes through the bead arrester, which
traps the vast majority of the entrained beads and returns them to the packing. The air is then
released to the air through the air measuring orifice and further wet and dry knob sensors (which
measure the temperature t4 and t3 separately).

3 | Page

Beads of water (coming about because of sprinkling) may get to be entrained noticeable all
around stream and after that lost from the framework. This misfortune does not add to cooling,
but rather must be made great by "make-up" water. To minimize this misfortune, a "droplet
arrester" or eliminator is fitted to the tower outlet. This part makes droplets mix, shaping drops
which are too huge to be entrained and this fall once more into the pressing.

Under the fan's activity, the air is driven upward through the wet packing. It will be seen that the
change of dry bulb temperature is littler than the change of wet bulb temperature, and that the air
outlet there is little distinction in the middle of wet and dry bulb temperature. This shows that the
air leaving is practically immersed. Relative humidity is 100% and this increase the moisture
content of the air due to the conversion of water into steam and the latent heat for this account
for most the cooling effect. Flow through the column may be observed through the transport
casing.

OBJECTIVE
To study the performance of a given cooling tower depends on the following variables:

Air flow rate

Water flow rate

Inlet water temperature

Inlet air temperature

Air humidity at the inlet

4 | Page

THEORY
Theory that involve in this experiment was first law of thermodynamics. First law of
thermodynamics state that energy can neither be created nor destroyed during a process. The
energy can only change forms. The conservation of energy can be expressed as:
(total energy in) (total energy out) = (change in total energy)

Energy can be transferred by heat, work and mass flow rate. In this cooling tower experiment,
energy was transferred in form of heat. Heat can be transferred from one system to another
system due to the temperature difference. Heat was transferred from high temperature to the
lower temperature. Heat was transferred in three different modes. For example conduction,
convection and radiation. All these three modes were involved in this cooling tower experiment.
When the hot water from the heater enter the cooling tower, energy was transferred in
form of heat. After the energy was transferred the high temperature (T 1) of hot water will
decrease low temperature (T2). Energy in form of heat was transferred by using three modes.
First was by conduction. Conduction is the transfer of energy from the more energetic particle of
substance to the adjacent less energetic ones as a result of interaction between particle. Second
was by convection. Convection is the transfer of energy between a solid surface and the adjacent
liquid that is in motion. When the hot water flow through the plate, energy in form of heat was
transferred from hot water to the plate. When the hot water was flow with higher flow rate, the
convection heat transfer also will increase. Third is by radiation. Radiation is the energy emitted
by matter in the form of electromagnetic waves. The hot water will transfer energy in form of
heat through radiation.
In this cooling tower experiment, we need to calculate the value of enthalpy. Enthalpy is
the amount of heat used or released in a system at constant pressure. The change in enthalpy was
related to the internal energy (U) and change in volume (V) and multiplied by constant pressure
(P). There are two ways to obtained the value of enthalpy. First is by looking at the table in the
thermodynamics text book. The enthalpy can be calculated by using equation:

5 | Page

H = U + PV
H: enthalpy
U: internal energy
P : pressure
V: volume
From equation of energy conservation:
Ein Eout = Esystem
For steady flow system, the change in kinetics and potential energies are negligible. So the
equation was reduced to:
Ein Eout = H = mCpT
mh = CpT
So,
h = CpT
h: enthalpy change
CP: heat capacity at constant pressure
T: temperature difference

6 | Page

APPARATUS

Deionized water
Bench top cooling tower unit

7 | Page

PROCEDURE

Valves V1 and V6 were checked and ensured to be closed and valve V7 to be partially

opened.
The load tank was filled with deionized water.
Deionized water was added to the wet bulb sensor reservoir to the fullest.
All appropriate tubing was connected to the differential pressure sensor.
The appropriate cooling tower packing was installed for the experiment.
Temperature set point of temperature controller was set to 45 C. The 1.0kW water heater

was switch on and water was heated up to 40 C.

The pump was switched on and the control valve V1 was slowly opened and the water

flow rate was set to 2LPM.

The damper was fully opened and the fan was switched on.
Blower switch was switched on after the water already went through the cooling tower.
The unit was run for 20 minutes to ensure float valve correctly adjusted the level in the

load tank. The make-up tank was refilled as required.

The damper and the flow rate were set to be constant.
The 1.0kW water heater was switched off to set the power as 0kW.
Record all the data required after 10 minute to ensure the unit stabilized for first trial and

another 10 minutes for second trial.

To measure the differential pressure across the orifice, valves V4 and V5 were opened

while valves V3 and V6 were closed.

To measure the differential pressure across the column, valves V3 and V6 were opened

while V4 and V5 were closed.

The water heater then was set to 0.5kW, 1.0kW and 1.5kW.
After all the experiments were done, the heaters were switched off and the water was let
to circulate through the cooling tower system for 3-5 minutes until the water cooled

down. 18. The fan was switched off and the fan damper was closed fully.
The pump and power supply were switched off.

RESULTS

8 | Page

EXPERIMENT 1
Column installed

: C

Heater : 1.0 kW
Blower
WATER

: Fully Open
FLOW 1.0

2.0

2.5

RATE (LPM)
T1 (oC)

32.4

32.1

31.8

T2 (oC)

28.2

28.0

27.9

T3 (oC)

29.5

29.5

29.5

T4 (oC)

30.5

30.6

30.5

T5 (oC)

41.9

35.0

33.8

T6 (oC)

27.5

28.5

28.6

DIFFERENT

70

68

65

53

65

68

38.6

48.9

PRESSURE ORIFICE
(Pa)
DIFFERENT
PRESSURE
COLUMN (Pa)
HEAT LOAD,

Q 20.45

(kW)

EXPERIMENT 2
Column installed

: C

Water Flow Rate, FT1 : 2.0 LPM

9 | Page

Blower

: Fully Open

HEATER (kW)

0.5

1.0

1.5

T1 (oC)

30.7

31.3

31.1

T2 (oC)

26.9

27.6

27.4

T3 (oC)

26.6

29.2

30.8

T4 (oC)

27.7

30.1

32.0

T5 (oC)

30.1

34.5

38.0

T6 (oC)

26.4

28.2

28.8

DIFFERENT

69

67

68

64

63

63

38.58

38.98

PRESSURE ORIFICE
(Pa)
DIFFERENT
PRESSURE
COLUMN (Pa)
HEAT LOAD,

Q 38.22

(kW)

SAMPLE CALCULATION

Heat Load, Q

= mCpT

Water flow rate

= 1.0 LPM

Mass flow rate of water

= 0.017 kg/s

Cooling range, T

= T5 T6
= 41.9 27.5
= 14.4 C/ 287.4 K

10 | P a g e

Heat capacity of water,Cp = 4.186

Heat Load, Q

= mCpT
= (0.017 kg/s) x (4.186) x (287.4 K)
= 20.72 kW

Both experiment 1 and 2 has same step calculation.

DISCUSSION

The cooling tower experiment is conducted to investigate the effect of air velocity on wet
bulb approach and the pressure drop through packing. The next objective of this experiment is to
obtain various parameters which are air flow rate, the water flow rate, the inlet water
temperature, the inlet air temperature and the air humidity at the inlet for the analysis of the
cooling tower performance. In order to study the performance of the cooling tower, the
parameters taken during the experiment must be recorded. To conduct this experiment we varies
two manipulated variables which are heater power and water flow rate. We also calculated heat
load in both experiment. . Heat Load is the amount of heat to be removed from the circulating
water within the tower
For experiment 1 we manipulate water flow rate at 1.0LPM, 2.0LPM, 2.5LPM. At the
same time in experiment we constant our heater power at 1.0 kW, blower fully opened. We also
used the same column which is column C. Based on the result that we obtain heat load increases
as the flow rate of water increases. Pressure at orifice are drop gradually as the water flow rate
increases while pressure at column increase as the water flow rate increases. In this experiment
the mass of water are varies based on the flow rate of water in order to calculate heat load. As
shown in table of experiment we can see the pattern of temperature whether dry bulb inlet and
outlet air and temperature wet bulb inlet and outlet air are all decreasing as the water flow rate
increases.
For experiment 2 we vary heater power at 0.5kW, 1.0kW and 1.5 kW. We constant the
flow rate of water at 2 LPM and the blower is fully open. In this experiment the mass of water
11 | P a g e

are constant because of we use the same value flow rate of water. Form the data that have been
calculated, the heat load are increasing as the heater power increases. As shown in table of
experiment we can see the pattern of temperature whether dry bulb inlet and outlet air and
temperature wet bulb inlet and outlet air are all decreasing as the heater power decreases.
Pressure at orifice are increasing as the heater power increases while pressure at column
decreases as the heater power decreases.

CONCLUSION

From the experiment that we had run, we can conclude that heater power and water flow
rate will varies the heat load, different pressure at orifice and column and temperature of wet and
dry bulb whether it is outlt or inlet. For experiment 1 and 2 both will increase ther heat load as
the water flow rate and heater power increasing respectively.

RECOMMENDATIONS
Throughout the experiment, there are a few precaution steps or recommendations that can
be taken in order to get more accurate results and data. First, the temperature of the cooling
tower unit must be set lower or at 45C because the maximum temperature of the cooling tower
is 45C. Second, we must wait for 10 15 minutes every time we have change the power of the
heater and water flow rate in order to stabilize the instrument. Third, the power of the heater and
water flow rate must not be higher than 1.5 kW and 2.0 LPM respectively. Lastly, handle the
instrument properly and use safety attire when in the pilot plant.

REFERENCES
1. Cooling Tower Unit Chemical Laboratory Manual, FakultiKejuruteraan Kimia,
University Teknologi Mara.
2. Cengel A. Y, Heat and Mass Transfer, Third Edition, The McGraw Companies
3. http://www.docstoc.com/docs/157040803/Cooling Tower Unit, retrieved on
September 2014

12 | P a g e

30th

APPENDICES

FIGURE 1: COOLING TOWER MACHINE WITH COLUMN C

13 | P a g e

14 | P a g e