Advanced Thermodynamics Engineering. Computational Mechanics and Applied Analysis Series (2002)

7R52. Advanced Thermodynamics Engineering. Computational Mechanics and Applied Analysis Series. - K Annamalai (Dept of Mech Eng, Texas A&M, College Station TX 77843) and IK Puri (Dept of Mech Eng, Univ of Illinois, Chicago IL). CRC Press LLC, Boca Raton FL. 2002. 786 pp. ISBN 0-8493-2553-5. $89.95. Reviewed by L Byrd (ARFL/VASM, WPAFB, 2790 D St, Dayton OH 45433-7402).This book is best suited as a textbook for students that have had two semesters of thermodynamics. Many of the topics can also be found in introductory texts, but will be somewhat lightly studied in a standard two-class series. There are a large number of topics that are not covered in the standard mechanical engineering sequence, although they come up in combustion or the chemical engineers sequence. One advantage of this book is that the material is in one text, and so it can act as a reference for practicing engineers. An extensive nomenclature list is included which is fortunate because the authors tend to use a lot of symbols and acronyms. It also makes it easier to read just the section of interest rather than starting at the beginning and reading material that is irrelevant to define the variables. A quick outline of the book reveals: Analysis of multi-component systems is introduced early in the text and carried through as needed. The introduction to statistical thermodynamics is brief due to the broad range of topics covered. The third and fourth chapters discuss first- and second-law analysis, entropy generation, and availability analysis, while Chapters 6 and 7 cover equations of state and pure fluids. Much of this is covered in undergraduate texts, but repeating it helps introduce the advanced material. The authors include numerous examples, and this material would be useful in design using entropy generation minimization. The nomenclature used in the European literature is introduced which is helpful when reviewing international texts. Chapter 5 is a short one describing thermodynamics in terms of four postulates rather than laws. It deals largely with use of the Legendre transform of the internal energy formulation of the equation of state. The remainder of the book deals with topics generally found in chemical engineering thermodynamics. Chapters 8 and 9 cover non-reacting mixtures. Chapter 11 principally introduces the thermodynamics of combustion and chapters 11–13 cover chemically reacting systems. One addition that would fit in with the aim of the text would be more coverage of psychrometrics. Another would be software to replace the tables of material property data found at the back of the text. The main criticism this reviewer has for the text is the large number of publishing errors. This reviewer estimates there are several hundred changes that should have been made before the book was printed. It should be stated that, except for the figures, the vast majority of these changes are minor. Examples are inconsistent subscripting of variables, changes in font size, or repeated words. By far, the biggest problem is the horrendous quality of the figures. In many figures, text was left out or partially obscured or just unreadable. In a few cases, the usefulness of the figure was totally negated. The graphics were of low quality. A comparison of the figures with those in the text from this reviewer’s undergraduate thermodynamics class, which was written over 30 years ago, shows that a great deal of improvement is possible. Writing a text is hard work, and for the authors to catch typing errors is difficult because the mind corrects for mistakes that occur. This reviewer will keep this book on his shelf and anticipates using it because the broad range of topics covered and the numerous examples given make it a good reference text. What this reviewer would really like to have is the corrected version because Advanced Thermodynamics Engineering could evolve into an excellent text.