This paper aims to demonstrate the importance of adequately estimating the discretization error intrinsic in the result of any numerical simulation. The problem under consideration is forced convection in a staggered circular tube heat exchanger. The problem is solved to analyze the effect of the distance between the tubes, aiming to optimize the heat exchanger’s geometrical configuration by two Reynolds numbers (50 and 100). The present work did not confirm the existence of an optimal geometrical point for the operation of staggered circular tube heat exchangers, as claimed in a numerical study published in the literature.
finite volume; CFD; numerical error; GCI; CFX
