Experimental investigation on the void fraction characteristics of a sudden expansion tube using wire-mesh sensors

Void fraction is an essential parameter of gas-liquid two-phase flow and experiments were executed to investigate the void fraction fluctuation characteristics of gas-liquid two phase flow through a sudden expansion tube. Two 16 × 16 wires mesh sensors were applied to measure the phase distribution of upstream pipe(pipe-32) and downstream pipe(pipe-50). The superficial gas velocity is in the range of 3.46 m/s - 22.46 m/s and the superficial liquid velocity ranges from 0.034 m/s to 0.414 m/s. Flow pattern evolution of upstream and downstream pipes was reconstructed and compared. The experiment results show that, in contrast to pipe-32, the void fraction of pipe-50 shows different trends with the increase of liquid and gas velocity. Liquid-carrying capacity is essential in the relationship between the void fraction of pipe-32 and pipe-50. The critical superficial liquid and gas velocities are proposed to characterize the liquid-carrying capacity. The maximum critical superficial gas and liquid velocity is 15.56 m/s and 0.207 m/s, respectively. Besides, a model is proposed to describe the relationship of void fraction between pipe-32 and pipe-50. It is found that the prediction error is less than ±10% in the case of annular flow.