Parametric study of two-phase flow by integral analysis based on power law distribution

To understand the fluid dynamic forces acting on a structure subjected to two-phase flow, it is essential to obtain detail information on the characteristics of that flow. The distributions of flow parameters across a pipe, such as gas velocity, liquid velocity and void fraction, may be assumed to follow a power law (Cheng 1998; Serizawa et al. 1975). The void fraction profile is, for example, uniform for bubbly flow, whereas for slug flow it is more or less parabolic. In the present work, the average values of momentum flux, slip ratio and other parameters were derived by integral analysis, based on approximate power law distributions. A parametric study with various distributions was performed. The existing empirical formulations for average void fraction, proposed by Wallis (1969), Zuber et al. (1967) and Ishii (1976), were considered in the derivation of the present results. Notably, the unsteady momentum flux for slug flow was approximated.     

Measurements of translational slug velocity and slug length using an image processing technique

Slug flow is a common flow regime that occurs in various industries, such as oil, gas, and power generation industries. In this study, the mean slug translational velocity and slug liquid length were measured using Phantom 9.2 software and an image processing analysis technique. The adopted image processing technique involved the analysis of video frames recorded from a high-speed camera (Phantom 9.2) in a horizontal transparent pipe using a combination of the approximate median method and blob analysis, along with an additional morphological process for detecting and segregating individual slugs. The experimental data were obtained from a designed two-phase flow test section, in which sets of superficial water and air velocities were selected to generate numerous slug flows. A good agreement with a maximum deviation of 6.7% between the estimated slug parameters from the adopted technique and the Phantom cine view controller software was achieved. Additionally, the developed technique provided precise results with a high processing speed of 10 frames per second.     

Few exact solution of the stokes’ problem with slip at the wall in case of suction/blowing

We provide an analytic solution for the problem of the unsteady, incompressible viscous fluid flow in the case of variable suction/blowing by applying similarity transform; the ‘slip’ condition at the boundary is considered. Several special cases with their solutions are given and are discussed graphically. It is observed that with an increase in suction the velocity increases and hence the boundary layer thickness decreases and with increase in blowing the velocity decreases and boundary layer thickness increases. It is also found that with an increase in slip parameter the velocity decreases.     

An experimental investigation of heat transfer in forced convective boiling of R134a,R123 and R134a/R123 in a horizontal tube

This paper reports an experimental study on flow boiling of pure refrigerants R134a and R123 and their mixtures in a uniformly heated horizontal tube. The flow pattern was observed through tubular sight glasses with an internal diameter of 10 mm located at the inlet and outlet of the test section. Tests were run at a pressure of 0.6 MPa in the heat flux ranges of 5–50 kW/m², vapor quality 0–100 percent and mass velocity of 150–600 kg/m²s. Both in the nucleate boiling-dominant region at low quality and in the two-phase convective evaporation region at higher quality where nucleation is supposed to be fully suppressed, the heat transfer coefficient for the mixture was lower than that for an equivalent pure component with the same physical properties as the mixture. The reduction of the heat transfer coefficient in mixture is explained by such mechanisms as mass transfer resistance and non-linear variation in physical properties etc. In this study, the contribution of convective evaporation, which is obtained for pure refrigerants under the suppression of nucleate boiling, is multiplied by the composition factor by Singal et al. (1984). On the basis of Chen’s superposition model, a new correlation is presented for heat transfer coefficients of mixture.     

Comprehensive experimental study of liquid-slug length and Taylor-bubble velocity in slug flow

Slug flow is an intermittent two-phase flow pattern that provokes undesirable pressure variations in pipes. Mathematical models are commonly used to study these variations; so that it is necessary to know the experimental liquid-slug length, Taylor-bubble length, and pressure drop to validate such mathematical models.In this work, we experimentally studied the water-air slug flow through an acrylic pipe loop 6 m long and 0.01905 m internal diameter. We assembled infrared sensors on the acrylic pipe to get voltage signals accordingly to the presence of liquid-slugs or Taylor-bubbles. We applied Fourier transform on the voltage signals to obtain dominant frequencies to determining the liquid-slug length.Moreover, we obtained the cross-correlation function to get the delay time between two groups of the voltage signals to determine the velocity of Taylor-bubbles. Additionally, we measured the liquid-slug length by video technique and pressure drop with a digital manometer. The liquid-slug lengths obtained by using dominant frequencies are in agreement with the ones measured by video technique.On the other hand, Taylor-bubbles could touch or not the wall pipe at different inclination pipe angles; this affects pressure drop. Then, we observed the inclination angle when the Taylor-bubble detaches from the wall of the pipe, under different flow conditions. We found that the Taylor-bubble detaching angle is 45°, and as the inclination angle is higher, the slug-liquid and Taylor-bubble lengths are smaller. The detaching angle can be used as a criterion to neglect the gas shear-stress into mathematical models to improve predictions of the hydrodynamic behavior of slug flow.     

Evaluation of hot-film,dual optical and Pitot tube probes for liquid–liquid two-phase flow measurements

An experimental study of kerosene–water upward two-phase flow in a vertical pipe was carried out using hot-film, dual optical and Pitot tube probes to measure the water, kerosene drops and mixture velocities. Experiments were conducted in a vertical pipe of 77.8 mm inner diameter at 4.2 m from the inlet (L/D=54). The tests were carried out for constant superficial water velocities of 0.29, 0.59 and 0.77 m/s (flow rates = 83, 167 and 220 l/min) and volume fractions of 4.2%, 9.2%, 18.6% and 28.2%. The Fluent 6.3.26 was used to model the single and two-phase flow and to reproduce the results for the experimental study. Two methods were used to evaluate the accuracy of the probes for the measurement of the velocities of water, drops and mixture for two-phase flow: (i) comparison of measured local velocities with predictions from the CFD simulation; (ii) comparison between the area-averaged velocities calculated from the integration of the local measurements of water, drops and mixture velocities and velocities calculated from flow meters’ measurements.The results for single phase flow measured using Pitot tube and hot-film probe agree well with CFD predictions. In the case of two-phase flow, the water and drops velocities were measured by hot-film and dual optical probes respectively. The latter was also used to measure the volume fraction. These three measured parameters were used to calculate the mixture velocity. The Pitot tube was also used to measure the mixture velocity by applying the same principle used for single phase flow velocity. Overall the mixture local velocity measured by Pitot tube and that calculated from hot-film and dual optical probe measurements agreed well with Fluent predictions. The discrepancy between the mixture area-averaged velocity and velocity calculated from flow meters was less than 10% except for one test case. It is concluded that the combined hot-film and optical approach can be used for water and drop velocity measurements with good accuracy for the flow conditions considered in this study. The Pitot tube can also be used for the measurement of mixture velocities for conditions of mixture velocities greater than 0.4 m/s. The small discrepancy between the predictions and experimental data from the present study and literature demonstrated that both instrumentation and CFD simulations have the potential for two-phase flow investigation and industrial applications.     

Slug frequency in high viscosity oil-gas two-phase flow: Experiment and prediction

The number of slug units that traverses a particular point at a given time within a defined pipe cross-section is known as slug frequency. The behaviour of this critical parameter for two-phase flow in high viscosity oils is significantly different from those of conventional oils (of less than 1 Pa s). In this experimental investigation, new data on slugging frequency in high viscosity oil-gas flow are reported. Scaled experiments were carried out using a mixture of air and mineral oil in a 17 m long horizontal pipe of 0.0762 m ID. A high-speed Gamma Densitometer of frequency of 250 Hz was used for data acquisition over a time interval of 30 s. For the range of flow conditions investigated, increase in oil viscosity was observed to strongly influence the slug frequency. Comparison of the present data with prediction models available in the literature revealed discrepancies. A new correlation incorporating the effect of viscosity on slug frequency has been proposed for horizontal flow. The proposed correlation will improve the prediction of slug frequency in high viscosity oils.     

Analysis of two dimensional and three dimensional supersonic turbulence flow around tandem cavities

The supersonic flows around tandem cavities were investigated by two-dimensional and three-dimensional numerical simulations using the Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equation with thek-ω turbulence model. The flow around a cavity is characterized as unsteady flow because of the formation and dissipation of vortices due to the interaction between the freestream shear layer and cavity internal flow, the generation of shock and expansion waves, and the acoustic effect transmitted from wake flow to upstream. The upwind TVD scheme based on the flux vector split with van Leer’s limiter was used as the numerical method. Numerical calculations were performed by the parallel processing with time discretizations carried out by the 4th-order Runge-Kutta method. The aspect ratios of cavities are 3 for the first cavity and 1 for the second cavity. The ratio of cavity interval to depth is 1. The ratio of cavity width to depth is 1 in the case of three dimensional flow. The Mach number and the Reynolds number were 1.5 and 4.5 × 10⁵, respectively. The characteristics of the dominant frequency between twodimensional and three-dimensional flows were compared, and the characteristics of the second cavity flow due to the first cavity flow was analyzed. Both two dimensional and three dimensional flow oscillations were in the ‘shear layer mode’, which is based on the feedback mechanism of Rossiter’s formula. However, three dimensional flow was much less turbulent than two dimensional flow, depending on whether it could inflow and outflow laterally. The dominant frequencies of the two dimensional flow and three dimensional flows coincided with Rossiter’s 2nd mode frequency. The another dominant frequency of the three dimensional flow corresponded to Rossiter’s 1st mode frequency.     

Analytical investigation of an inductive flow sensor with arc-shaped electrodes for water velocity measurement in two-phase flows

An inductive flow sensor with spot-shaped electrodes (IFS-SE) is sensitive to the shape of the flow profile and is restricted to be used to measure the flow rate of axisymmetric single-phase flows in a circular pipe. In many cases of application, it is not possible to provide a fully developed flow profile. Therefore, the inductive flow sensor has to cope with flow profiles that are not fully developed. To improve the accuracy, an inductive flow sensor with a pair of arc-shaped electrodes flush-mounted on the internal surface of an insulating section of a pipe is proposed in this article to investigate the characteristics of vertical gas-water two-phase flows. The effect of the flow profile on the inductive flow sensor is analyzed. A key contribution of the present work is to estimate the relationship between the induced voltage and the velocity of the conductive phase in two-phase flows. The estimation is achieved by the analytical calculation of magnetic-inductive equations through the method of variables separation. The analytical solution is compared with the results from an ideal model and from numerical simulation. Experiments are conducted to calibrate the inductive flow sensor with arc-shaped electrodes (IFS-AE). It is noted that the proposed IFS-AE can be adopted to obtain the velocity of the conductive phase in two-phase flows by measuring the voltage induced on the arc-shaped electrodes.     

A study on pressure drop characteristics of refrigerants in horizontal flow boiling

An experimental investigation on the flow pattern and pressure drop was carried out for both an adiabatic and a diabatic two-phase flow in a horizontal tube with pure refrigerants R134a and R123 and their mixtures as test fluids. The observed flow patterns were compared to the flow pattern map of Kattan et al., which predicted well the present data over the entire regions of mass velocity in this study. The measured frictional pressure drop in the adiabatic experiments increased with an increase in vapor quality and mass velocity. These data were compared to various correlations proposed in the past for the frictional pressure drop. The Chisholm correlation underpredicted the present data both for pure fluids and their mixtures in the entire mass velocity range of 150 to 600 kg/m²s covered in the measurements, while the Friedel correlation was found to overpredict the present data in the stratified and stratified-wavy flow region, and to underpredict in the annular flow region.     

Behavior of rotating stall cell in a high specific-speed diagonal flow fan

An experimental investigation was carried out to clarify unsteady flow fields with rotating stall cell, especially behavior of stall cell, in a high specific-speed diagonal flow fan. As its specific-speed is very high for a diagonal flow fan, its pressure-flow rate curve tends to indicate unstable characteristics caused by rotating stall similar to axial flow fan. Although for an axial flow fan many researchers have investigated such the flow field, for a diagonal flow fan little study has been done. In this study, velocity fields at rotor inlet in a high specific-speed diagonal flow fan were measured by use of a single slant hot-wire probe. These data were processed by using the ““Double Phase-Locked Averaging“ (DPLA) technique, i. e. phases of both the rotor blade and the stall cell were taken into account. The behaviors of stall cell at rotor inlet were visualized for the meridional, tangential and radial velocity.     

Stratified steady and unsteady two-phase flows between two parallel plates

To understand fluid dynamic forces acting on a structure subjected to two-phase flow, it is essential to get detailed information about the characteristics of two-phase flow. Stratified steady and unsteady two-phase flows between two parallel plates have been studied to investigate the general characteristics of the flow related to flow-induced vibration. Based on the spectral collocation method, a numerical approach has been developed for the unsteady two-phase flow. The method is validated by comparing numerical result to analytical one given for a simple harmonic two-phase flow. The flow parameters for the steady two-phase flow, such as void fraction and two-phase frictional multiplier, are evaluated. The dynamic characteristics of the unsteady two-phase flow, including the void fraction effect on the complex unsteady pressure, are illustrated.     

Simulation and experimental investigation on gas-liquid two-phase flow separation behaviors in multitube T-Junction separator

A specially designed separator for gas-liquid two-phase flow separation and measurement is proposed. The flow characteristics and working scope are studied under different gas/liquid superficial velocities and different flow patterns through FLUENT numerical simulation and experimental research. The working scope of the separator is related to both the gas and liquid superficial velocity. The separator work well under the when the gas superficial velocity ranges from 0.65 to 21 m/s, and the liquid superficial velocity ranges from 0.01 to 0.31 m/s. When the actual working condition is beyond this range, the performance is not so outstanding in case of partial slug flow and annular. Under the working range of the separator, the measurement error of gas and liquid mass flow rates is less than ±2.5%. The special structure provides a buffer space for liquid slug, which shows good shock resistance capacity under high liquid superficial velocity. The investigation offers a valuable guidance for multiphase flow rates measurement.     

Flow pattern and pressure drop of pure refrigerants and their mixture in horizontal tube

Two-Phase flow pattern and pressure drop data were obtained for pure refrigerants R134a and R123 and their mixtures as test fluids in a horizontal tube. The flow pattern is observed through tubular sight glasses located at inlet and outlet of the test section. The flow map of Baker developed for air-water two-phase flow at atmospheric pressure failed to predict the observed flow patterns at the higher value of the mass velocity used in the present study. The map of Kattan et al. predicted the data well over the entire region of mass velocity selected in the present study. The measured pressure drop increased with an increase in vapor quality and mass velocity. A new two-phase multiplier was developed from a dimensional analysis of the frictional pressure drop data measured in the present experiment. This new multiplier was found successfully to correlate the frictional pressure drop.     

Identification of gas-liquid two-phase flow patterns in a horizontal pipe based on ultrasonic echoes and RBF neural network

This paper proposes a novel flow pattern identification method using ultrasonic echo signals within the pipe wall. A two-dimensional acoustic pressure numerical model is established to investigate the ultrasonic pulse transmission behavior between the wall-gas and wall-liquid interface. Experiments were also carried out at a horizontal air-water two-phase flow loop to measure the ultrasonic echo pulse signals of stratified flow, slug flow, and annular flow. It is interesting to find that the attenuation of the ultrasonic pulse at the wall-liquid interface is faster than the attenuation at the wall-gas interface. An RBF neural network is constructed for online flow pattern identification. The normalized envelop area and the area ratios of the echo spectrum are selected as the input parameters. The results show that the stratified flow, slug flow, and annular flow can be identified with an accuracy of 94.0%.     

An experimental study of critical heat flux in non-uniformly heated vertical annulus under low flow conditions

An experimental study on critical heat flux (CHF) has been performed in an internally heated vertical annulus with non-uniform heating. The CHF data for the chopped cosine heat flux have been compared with those for uniform heat flux obtained from the previous study of the authors, in order to investigate the effect of axial heat flux distribution on CHF. The local CHF with the parameters such as mass flux and critical quality shows an irregular behavior. However, thetotal critical power with mass flux and theaverage CHF with critical quality are represented by a unique curve without the irregularity. The effect of the heat flux distribution on CHF is large at low pressure conditions but becomes rapidly smaller as the pressure increases. The relationship between the critical quality and the boiling length is represented by a single curve, independent of the axial heat flux distribution. For non-uniform axial heat flux distribution, the prediction results from Doerffer et al.’s and Bowring’s CHF correlations have considerably large errors, compared to the prediction for uniform heat flux distribution. KeyWords : Critical Heat Flux, Heated Vertical Annulus, Low Mass Flux, Wide Range Pressure, Non-uniform Heating, Effect of Axial Heat Flux Distribution, Boiling Length     

Characterization of flow homogeneity downstream of a slotted orifice plate in a two-phase flow using electrical resistance tomography

Two-phase flows are complex and unpredictable in nature, commonly encountered in a majority of fluid transport systems. The accurate measurement of two-phase flow is critical for a wide range of applications from wet stream to multiphase flows. There are different methods to meter two-phase flow in various industries. One approach is to produce a flow meter that does not require the individual flow components to be separated and measured separately. This goal can be met if a homogenized mixture is produced which can be measured by a standard single phase flow meter. The slotted orifice plate was invented as a flow meter for single phase flows, it is independent upon upstream flow conditions. Slotted orifice plate flow meter's utilization in two-phase flow revealed that it is highly capable of working as a flow conditioner transforming most of the multiphase flow regimes into a fairly uniform mixture. This study measures how the relative homogeneity of an air/water mixture varies downstream of the slotted plate in a horizontal pipe for various upstream conditions including elongated bubble and slug flow regimes using electrical resistance tomography (ERT). According to this study, the optimal location with a maximum homogeneity was determined to be between 1.5 and 2.5 pipe diameters downstream of the slotted orifice plate. This indicates that placing a slotted orifice plate at the obtained distance upstream of another flow meter such as a venturi coupled with a density measuring device like a radiation based densitometer or an electrical impedance device will help in obtaining accurate multiphase flow rate measurement.     

Experimental analysis for reducing refrigerant-induced noise of 4-way cassette type air conditioner

Various refrigerant flow patterns can produce a range of noise types according to their cycle conditions. Consequently, the identification of flow patterns in a tube is crucial to reducing refrigerant-induced noise. Because of the obstacles involved in identifying them accurately by experiment, in this paper, these flow patterns are estimated from the flow pattern map. Working from the assumption that the refrigerant-induced noise for an air conditioner in the heating mode comes from slug flow in the condenser-outlet pipe, the reduction of refrigerant-induced noise by avoiding slug flow in a tube is examined. To fully understand the conditions under which the refrigerant-induced noise occurs, cycle simulator equipment for an outdoor unit is developed. With this cycle simulator, noise tests of 4-way cassette type indoor units are performed under the conditions that the refrigerant-induced noise occurs. Increasing the mass flux in a tube by reducing the diameter of the condenser-outlet pipe can avoid slug flow, and the refrigerant-induced noise can therefore be reduced. The results of the cycle simulator can be verified with an outdoor unit 5HP system multi air conditioner and the results are well in line with simulator results. This paper was recommended for publication in revised form by Associate Editor Yeon June Kang Hyung-Suk Han received a B.S. degree in Production and Mechanical Engineering from Pusan National University in 1996. He then went on to receive his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Pusan National University in 1998 and 2007, respectively. Dr. Han is currently a Senior Researcher at Defense Agency of Technology and Quality, Pusan, Korea. He is currently serving as a Co-Researcher of Noise and Vibration Analysis Laboratory in Pusan National University. Dr. Han’s research interests are in the area of the mechanical applications of noise and vibration including refrigerant-induced noise. Wei-Bong Jeong received a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Seoul National University in 1978. He then went on to receive his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from KAIST in 1980 and from Tokyo Institute of Technology in 1990, respectively. Dr. Jeong is currently a Professor at the Mechanical Engineering at Pusan National University in Busan, Korea. He is currently serving as an Academic Director of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering. Dr. Jeong’s research interests are in the area of the measurement and signal processing of noise and vibration, finite/boundary element programming of noise and vibration, fluid-structure interactions and acoustic-structure interactions.