Search results for "RUSHTON TURBINE"
showing 10 items of 13 documents
CFD simulations of dense solid–liquid suspensions in baffled stirred tanks: Prediction of solid particle distribution
2013
Abstract Industrial tanks devoted to the mixing of solid particles into liquids are often operated at an impeller speed N less than Njs (defined as the lowest speed allowing the suspension of all particles): under such conditions the distribution of solid-particles is very far from being homogeneous and very significant concentration gradients exist. The present work is devoted to assessing the capability of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) in predicting the particle distribution throughout the tank. The CFD model proposed by Tamburini et al. [58] and successfully applied to the prediction of the sediment amount and shape was adopted here to simulate the particle distribution under partia…
Oscillation dynamics of free vortex surface in uncovered unbaffled stirred vessels
2016
Abstract The main feature of unbaffled stirred tanks is the highly swirling liquid motion, which leads to the formation of a central vortex on the liquid free surface, when the vessel is operated without top-cover (Uncovered Unbaffled Stirred Tanks, UUST). One of the main drawbacks of such vessels, that limits their industrial applicability, is the possible onset of low-frequency sloshing of the free surface. In this work, original data on oscillation dynamics in UUST are presented. In particular, data focus on the oscillation amplitude as well as on their frequency. Data were obtained by means of a novel experimental technique based on digital image analysis. The effect of impeller geometr…
Particle distribution in dilute solid liquid unbaffled tanks via a novel laser sheet and image analysis based technique
2013
The availability of experimental information on particle distribution inside stirred tanks is a topic of great importance for many industrial applications such as catalysis and polymerization. The measurement of solid particle distribution is not simple and the development of suitable measuring techniques is still an open problem in chemical engineering research. In this work, a non-intrusive optical technique for measuring particle concentration fields in solid–liquid systems is discussed. The “Laser Sheet Image Analysis” (LSIA) technique described here makes use of a laser sheet, a digital camera for image acquisition and a suitable procedure for post-processing. It is able to provide sol…
Free-surface shape in unbaffled stirred vessels: Experimental study via digital image analysis
2013
There is a growing interest in using unbaffled stirred tanks for addressing a number of processing needs such as low shear damage (sensitive biocultures), low attrition (solid–liquid applications), deep-cleaning/sterilization (pharmaceutical applications). The main feature of uncovered, unbaffled stirred tanks is highly swirling motion of the fluid that results in a deformation of the free liquid surface. At sufficiently high agitation speeds the resulting whirlpool reaches the impeller and gives rise to a gas–liquid dispersion, so leading to the formation of a dispersion without the use of gas-sparger; the so-called self-inducing operation of the vessel. In this work, digital image analysi…
Large-Eddy Simulation of Turbulent Flow in an Unbaffled Stirred Tank Driven by a Rushton Turbine
2005
The turbulent flow fieldgeneratedin an unbaffledstirredtank by a Rushton turbine was computedby large-eddy simulation (LES). The Smagorinsky model was used to model the unresolved, or sub-grid, scales. A general purpose CFD code was appropriately modified in order to allow the computation of the sub-gridviscosity andto perform statistics on the computedresults. The numerical predictions were comparedwith the literature results for comparable configurations andwith experimental data obtainedusing particle image velocimetry. A very goodagreement was foundas regards both time-averagedresolv edfield s andturb ulence quantities. 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Direct numerical simulations of creeping to early turbulent flow in unbaffled and baffled stirred tanks
2018
Abstract It has been known for a long time that the fluid flow and several global quantities, such as the power and pumping numbers, are about the same in baffled and unbaffled mechanically stirred vessels at low Reynolds numbers, but bifurcate at some intermediate Re and take drastically different values in fully turbulent flow. However, several details are not yet completely understood, notably concerning the relation of this bifurcation with the flow features and the transition to turbulence. In order to shed light on these issues, computational fluid dynamics was employed to predict the flow field in two vessels stirred by a six-bladed Rushton turbine at Reynolds numbers from 0.2 to 600…
Numerical simulations of the dependency of flow pattern on impeller clearance in stirred vessels
2001
The flow and turbulence fields in a fully baffled vessel stirred by a Rushton turbine have been simulated by means of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques. The simulation techniques adopted (the "Sliding-grid" and "Inner-outer" methods) are fully predictive and require no experimental data as boundary or initial conditions. The effect of clearance (C) on the flow patterns in stirred vessels was simulated as the flow field transition observed can be considered a particularly stringent benchmark for the testing of CFD techniques. The results are compared with previously obtained LDA data and show that the double- to single-loop transition experimentally observed when impeller clearan…
An experimental study of double-to-single-loop transition in stirred vessels
1999
The velocity characteristics of the flows in a fully baffled vessel of diameter T = 290 mm stirred by a Rushton impeller of diameter D = T/3 were investigated by means of laser-Doppler anemometry measurements. The effects of clearance and rotational speed on the flow patterns in the vessel were studied. It was found that at impeller clearances from the bottom of the vessel (C) around 0.2 T the characteristic double-loop flow pattern undergoes a transition to a single-loop one with the impeller stream direction becoming partly axial and being inclined at around 25 to 30° to the horizontal. The impeller stream inclination varied with radial distance from the impeller, as well as with angular …
Numerical prediction of flow fields in baffled stirred vessels: A comparison of alternative modelling approaches
1998
Abstract Numerical simulations of the flow field in baffled mixing tanks, based on three alternative methods, are presented and discussed. In the first method, the impeller is not explicitly simulated, and its effects are modelled by imposing suitable, empirically derived, boundary conditions to the external flow. In the second method, the whole vessel volume is divided into two concentric, partially overlapping, regions. In the inner region, containing the impeller, the flow field is simulated in the rotating reference frame of the latter, while in the outer region simulations are conducted in the reference frame of the laboratory. Information is iteratively exchanged between the two regio…
Dense solid–liquid off-bottom suspension dynamics: Simulation and experiment
2009
Dense solid–liquid off-bottom suspension inside a baffled mechanically stirred tank equipped with a standard Rushton turbine is investigated. Dynamic evolution of the suspension from start-up to steady-state conditions has been determined by both visual experiments and computational fluid dynamics (CFDs). A classical Eulerian–Eulerian multifluid model (MFM) along with the “homogeneous” k–ε turbulence model is adopted to simulate suspension dynamics. In these systems the drag inter-phase force affects both solids suspension and distribution. Therefore, different computational approaches are tested in order to compute this term. Simulation results are compared with images obtained from the re…