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COBEM 2017
24th ABCM International Congress of Mechanical Engineering
Experimental analysis of two-phase flow in a radial centrifugal pump
Submission Author:
Jhoan M.C. Cubas , PR
Co-Authors:
Henrique Stel, Edgar Ofuchi, Dalton Bertoldi, Moisés Marcelino Neto, Rigoberto Morales, Jhoan M.C. Cubas
Presenter: Jhoan M.C. Cubas
doi://10.26678/ABCM.COBEM2017.COB17-1213
Abstract
The presence de free gas inside centrifugal pumps cause instabilities and degradation of the pump pressure-rise curve. Depending on the intake gas fraction, liquid flow rate, intake pressure and rotational speed, this degradation can be mild or severe. Therefore, the knowledge of operating conditions and the behavior of the phases related to this performance degradation allow proper pump operation. In this scenario, this study presents an experimental work developed to perform, simultaneously, head evaluation, flow visualization and inlet gas void fraction measurement in a commercial radial pump. One of the pump impellers were reproduced in a transparent material, in order to allow flow visualization while minimizing the effect of non-original pump parts on performance. In addition, a wire-mesh sensor is used to provide actual gas void fraction measurement at the pump inlet. The images obtained were associated with the instabilities observed in the performance curves of the pump, as a way to understand the phenomena related to the performance degradation in two-phase flow operation. This procedure, together with the measurement of the actual gas volume fractions in the pump inlet, can provide an interesting source of data that can be useful to support theoretical models or validate numerical simulations.
Keywords
centrifugal pumps, Two-phase Flow, performance, visualization, wire-mesh sensor
