Experimental Study of Two Phase Flow in a New Proposed Orthogonal Mixture Separator

Abstract

A new kind of mixture separator based on the recirculating air vortex phenomenon is presented in this study. This idea is proposed as a cost-effective alternative to other more complicated conventional separators. The design of the separator is its main advantage. It is a symmetric cavity (H=W=25mm) with a circular outlet (10mm) on the upper side. The recirculating air vortex in this specific volume of the cavity in combination with the pressure difference in this region leads to the separation of one fraction of the mixture. In this study two fluids with different densities are tested (water and air). In this series of separation experiments one cavity fitted in five different locations (5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 times the hydraulic diameter value) of the pipe is examined. In order to optimize the system performance a new laboratory apparatus was constructed and designed to cover a wide range of mixture cases (phase mixing percentage). Recording the inflow volume flow rates and the air pressure at the inlet in each air-water separation experiment the values of interest have been calculated. The results have been processed to indicate the areas of best performance of this initial design and to contribute to future alteration to increase the separation efficiency.
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