1.
Water enters the upper tubes. As it passes through the tubes, turbulence of the water is maintained, even at low water flow, due to the internal rifling of the tubing.
2.
Refrigerant liquid enters via the lower refrigerant tube and is forced to follow a long spiral flow path. This flow path is created by the tight tolerance between the copper tubing and the steel side walls.
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3.
A small amount of refrigerant travels in an axial flow caused by the pressure drop between spiral layers. This flow strips stagnant refrigerant from the finned tubing. This allows the use of tubing with 26 fins per inch, resulting in a transfer surface which is 3.7 times that of smooth tubing.
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4.
As the liquid refrigerant absorbs heat from the water it begins to boil off, exiting the heat exchanger as a gas.
5.
The water tubes cross over the mid-point of the heat exchanger. The outside tube becomes the inside tube and the inside tube becomes the outside tube. This results in two tubes of exactly the same length, with equal pressure drop and equal heat exchange.
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6.
The chilled water exits the two lower water tubes.
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