Development of Design Software for Engine Radiators

In order to reduce investment in engine radiator design and to improve computing precision, a radiator design software was developed using the PowerBuilder. The software consists of performance calculation, as well as calculation for optimizing fin spacing, fin height, tube length and the number of tube rows. By comparison, the results of calculation and experiment were in good agreement. Then the effects of fin spacing, opening angle, wind speed and glycol content in coolant on the performance of a radiator were analyzed. The results indicate that the heat transfer performance of a radiator increase with the increment of the wind speed and with the decrement of the fin spacing; the air resistance reduces with the decrement of the opening angle; the coolant outlet temperature decreases with the increment of the glycol content.