Effect of typical and perforated discontinuous helical turbulators on flow and heat transfer in an air to water double pipe heat exchanger is experimentally studied. Experimental analysis is conducted for different values of open area ratio (0-0.0625), Reynolds number (6000-12,000) and pitch ratio (1.83-5.83). According to experimental data, correlations for Nusselt number, friction factor and thermal performance are presented as functions of variable parameters. Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGA II) is applied to find the optimal designs of high efficiency heat exchanger. Pareto front is presented as set of multiple optimum solutions. Results show that friction factor and Nusselt number reduce with rise of open area ratio and pitch ratio. Thermal performance is an increasing function of open area ratio while it is a decreasing function of pitch ratio. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.