Spouting behaviors of binary mixtures of cylindroid and spherical particles

Spouting behaviors of cylindroid and spherical particles in a spouted bed are experimentally investigated. The characteristics of flow pattern and pressure drop of the binary mixtures are figured out and three kinds of cylindroid particles with different sizes and shapes are involved in experiments to discuss effects of particle size and shape on the spouting behaviors in beds. The emphasis is laid on the influence of the volume fraction of cylindroid particles, X_c, on the spouting phenomena, including the total pressure drop, the minimum spouting velocity, and fountain height. Results show that, the shapes and sizes of cylindroid particles, mainly including equivolume diameter and aspect ratio, significantly affect the spouting behaviors. There is a maximum volume fraction, X_c,max, for each kind of cylinders to maintain the stable fountain at a certain gas velocity. With the same gas velocity, X_c,max is lower for the cylinders with higher aspect ratio. © 2014 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 61: 58–67, 2015