At 14:30 15/05/98 -0400, you wrote:
>
>Then can you explain why it took much longer to cool down the wort when I
>ran the water fast than when I ran it slow?
>Andy
Off hand, I suggest that the flow was cavitating - tiny volumes of liquid
experiencing a rapid fall in pressure, go into the vapour phase. This can be
caused by rapid passage through a restriction (such as the faucet), and
would be aided by the temperature gradient in the heat exchanger. In
addition to damaging the surface of hard materials upon collapse of the
vapour bubbles, a cavitating flow is extremely inefficient at transferring
heat; just ask the ghosts of the Chernobyl engineers.
Allen Nugent
Graduate School of Biomedical Engineering
University of New South Wales
Sydney 2052 Australia
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