Spinning disk systems have been an exciting field of research due to complex underlying phenomena. This work elucidates a comprehensive evaluation of the cumulative impact of multiple parameters on the transport phenomena in a free-spinning disk. The effect of sand roughness factor (ĸ) on the thermo-hydraulic characteristics is assessed for three different values of 0.01, 0.02 and 0.03, and comparisons are made with respect to a hydraulically smooth surface. These determinations are made for five different angular velocities of the disk corresponding to the rotational Reynold’s number ( \({Re}_{\omega })\) range of 8.69 × 103 to 3.47 × 105 and encompassing the turbulent regime as well. This research examines air and hydrogen (H2) in their gaseous states for the ambient environment. For this study, a finite element (FE) analysis was conducted by employing COMSOL Multiphysics®, followed by experimentation using traditional methods such as thermocouples and infrared thermography to measure the temperature field and confirm the findings obtained from the FE analysis. The investigation is conducted under transient conditions with a constant heat flux and a no-slip boundary condition. Visual representations are given to exhibit the relationship between various factors influencing heat transport. It is found that for air, the maximum enhancement is 111.62% at a rotational Reynold’s number (Reω) of 1.4 × 105 corresponding to the angular velocity of 838.09 rad/s for a roughness factor of 0.03. Similarly, hydrogen (H2) shows a maximum increase of 94% for effective heat transfer at an angular velocity of 2095.23 rad/s and roughness factor of 0.03. Furthermore, the viscous dissipation is found to increase with increasing angular velocities. The effect negatively impacts heat convection, especially for incremental values of the roughness factor, thus limiting the use of sand roughness to comparatively lower angular velocities. The findings of the current study have practical implications across various applications, including turbomachinery, chemical vapour deposition (CVD) reactors, disk gyroscopes, hard drives, disk brakes, axial flux permanent magnet (AFPM) machines, navigation systems, and more.
