The effect of tube wall heat conduction on the natural convection in a long cylindrical envelope with an adiabatic lateral surface

The effect of the tube wall heat conduction on the natural convection in a tilted long cylindrical envelope with constant, but different temperature of the two ends and an adiabatic outer surface was numerically investigated. The envelope is supposed to be a simplified model for the pulse tube in a pulse tube refrigerator when the pulse tube is positioned at different orientations. It is found that the cylindrical envelope lateral wall heat conduction can enhance the heat transfer from the hot end to the cold end, not only because of the increase in pure heat conduction in the wall, but more importantly, also the intensification of the natural convection within the enclosure. This enhancement is resulted from the big temperature difference between the tube wall and the adjacent fluid near the hot and cold ends. Adoption of low thermal conductivity tube can effectively reduce such additional heat transfers from hot to cold end, thus reducing the loss of cooling capacity for the pulse tube refrigerator.