CFD investigation of dense phase pneumatic conveying at a pipeline enlargement--颗粒学报PARTICUOLOGY

McGlinchey, D., Cowell, A., & Crowe, R. (2012). CFD investigation of dense phase pneumatic conveying at a pipeline enlargement. Particuology, 10(2), 176–183. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.partic.2011.11.004

CFD investigation of dense phase pneumatic conveying at a pipeline enlargement

Don McGlinchey^*, Andrew Cowell, Ryan Crowe

School of Engineering and Computing, Glasgow Caledonian University, Glasgow, Scotland, UK

10.1016/j.partic.2011.11.004

Volume 10, Issue 2, April 2012, Pages 176-183

Received 12 July 2011, Revised 3 November 2011, Accepted 12 November 2011, Available online 1 March 2012.

E-mail: D.McGlinchey@gcu.ac.uk

Highlights

► The effect of an expansion in pneumatic conveying pipeline bore investigated.

► A dense phase ‘plug’ of fine particulate material modelled by 3D CFD.

► An abrupt expansion may result in a plug which having increased aeration.

► In the gradual expansion case the plug was seen to collapse and elongate.

► The abrupt and gradual expansion geometries resulted in recirculation zones.

Abstract

The practice of stepping a conveying line is not new and there are many examples in industry; however, the details of the flow behaviour at the step have not been extensively studied. Three step geometries were modelled: an ‘abrupt’ step and two ‘gradual’ step-up geometries from a pipe bore of 75–100 mm. The flow behaviour of a single plug of material passing through these geometries was investigated using the ‘Eulerian’ CFD model from Fluent. Solids volume fractions were recorded at 0.01 s time steps at several point locations, and visualised throughout the pipe.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Pneumatic conveying; Stepped pipeline; Plug flow; CFD

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