Abstract
Natural convection heat transfer in enclosures is an area that has particular significance to a wide range of applications. However, heat transfer from enclosures with openings to the surroundings, such as open windows in buildings or passively ventilated electronics enclosures, have received far less attention. In this regard, there is still a lack of generalised relationships that can be used in determining the heat transfer in partially open enclosures. As such, this work presents an experimental and computational investigation of the natural convection heat loss from partly open cubical enclosures, with various opening configurations, with a view to understanding the mechanism and developing relationships that describe it. It shows that heat transfer from the partly open enclosures is most strongly influenced by the Rayleigh number and the opening size.
