| "We need connections to the UW which is doing long-term research and then has the experience to do tech transfer to the corporate structure." |
To paraphrase Bob Dylan: Some answers really are "blowing in the wind."
That's wind tunnel, to be exact. Housed in the laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Karen A. Thole, the wind tunnel is providing invaluable information to Racine's Modine Manufacturing Company.
But the prevailing winds had to blow in the right direction for the parties to meet. This growing research relationship began the way many such partnerships start: with a call to the University-Industry Relations program. Among the 30 year-old program's many functions is matching up industry questions with the spectrum of university researchers who have the answers, says Lawrence A. Casper, an associate director at UIR and an assistant dean in the college's Office of Engineering R&D and Technology Transfer.
"UIR is a one-stop shop for industry people because we involve the whole campus," Casper says. "This is especially the case with companies which have a broad technology base. UIR has a team approach where we can bring in people from all parts of campus to find solutions. Many companies have a broad range of interests and the best response to their needs may come from more than just one part of campus."
Modine, as a manufacturer of heat exchangers for the automotive and building markets, was working with UIR to explore ways the university could help. Casper recalled that he'd met with a new mechanical engineering faculty member with expertise in fluid mechanics and heat transfer, and a new research relationship was born.
Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Karen A. Thole and her graduate students are shown in the new wind tunnel facility which the group helped to design. Thole is using the facility to collaborate on a project with Racine's Modine Manufacturing Company.
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Modine was in the process of optimizing airside fin configurations for its heat exchangers, says company senior research engineer Jonathan Wattelet. "We were applying automotive louvered fins to low-velocity commercial applications. We needed to know the optimal configuration--was it different from the current configuration?"
The company was already using computational fluid dynamics to study the question, but didn't have any tools inside to validate designs experimentally. "We needed laser doppler velocimetry (LDV) to examine air flows and cost has prevented us from exploring this in house. Karen Thole came along with the wind tunnel facility and LDV equipment."
Step one was to design the "test rig"--that is, the actual model of the louvered fins that would be tested in the wind tunnel. Thole's group used computational fluid dynamics simulations in the college's Model Advanced Facility (MAF), a test bed for the latest work station hardware and software applications. "We needed to figure out first how many rows we needed to make accurate measurements," Thole says. "Then we designed a scaled-up part for use in the wind tunnel to obtain detailed measurements." That part is currently being built by Modine and should be ready for tunnel tests in early 1997.
"We want to know what flow physics govern this heat transfer so that we can optimize the process," Thole explains. "You need a flow source--that's the wind tunnel--and the optimum measurement tool is the one we're using: laser doppler velocimetry."
Thole's work is funded partly through UIR's Grants-to-Faculty Program, which links faculty with Wisconsin industry on projects that have economic development significance. About 15 such grants are given each year by UIR, says Casper, and are partially funded by the state. "We've tracked them and found that these grants have high leverage--their payback over time is about $14 for every original dollar in the grant by acting as seed money for new research projects and attracting other grant money."
As the project continues in its first phase, Wattelet reports there is great optimism about the results. "So far things have been going really well, and we hope to continue on for at least another year and have Karen empirically determine heat transfer coefficients for these louvered fins," Wattelet says. "We're always looking for ways to leverage our research efforts. We want to try to learn as many innovative things as we can--we're looking for ways to translate cutting-edge research to products.
"This is not a simple process. Sometimes we don't have funding to do exploratory research up front--we need connections to the UW which is doing long-term research and then has the experience to do tech transfer to the corporate structure."
--By Karen Walsh--
| For further information, please contact: |
Lawrence A. Casper, 608/265-4104
casper@engr.wisc.edu
Karen A. Thole, 608/262-0923
Copyright 1997 The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
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Date last modified: Wednesday, 19-Mar-1997 12:00:00 CST
Date created: 19-Mar-1997
