Characteristics of slug flow in a fluidized bed of polyethylene particles

The slug flow behavior of polyethylene particles was examined in a fluidized bed of 7 cm ID and 50 cm in height. The employed polymer particles were high density polyethylene (HDPE) with the average particle size of 603 μm. The slugging flow of polyethylene particles was analyzed from the measured pressure drop signals by classical statistical methods such as absolute average deviation, probability density function, power spectrum, auto-cor-relation, and cross-correlation. The results show that in spite of high dielectric constant of polymer particles, the slugging phenomena such as incipient slugging velocity, slugging frequency and slugging rise velocity were very similar to the Geldart B type non-polymeric particles. It was observed that slug frequencies decreased with gas velocity and the limiting slug frequency was observed for the gas velocities in this study.