Experimental and computational analysis of a cyclone separator with a novel vortex finder

Abstract

Simulations and experimental methods were used to evaluate the performance of notched vortex finders in a cyclone separator with a tangential inlet. The vortex finder was cut obliquely. Four types of cyclone separators with different vortex finder structures were studied. One of the separators did not have a cut at the vortex finder, while the other separators had cuts located at 45°, 135°, and 225° opposite to the inlet of the separator. An unsteady Reynolds stress transport model (RSM) was implemented for the gas-phase flow field, and a discrete phase model (DPM) was adopted for the particle phase. Considering the asymmetric flow field in the separator with a tangential inlet, the distribution of axial velocity, tangential velocity, and radial velocity along the circumference were discussed, and the effect of the notched vortex finder on the flow field in the separator was shown in detail. The grade efficiencies of the four models were compared. The simulation results show that the separation performances of the cyclone separators with notched vortex finders were greatly improved over the separation performance of the original separator. When the cut position was located 225° opposite to the inlet, the separation performance of the cyclone separator improved most obviously. Experiments were carried out to confirm the advantages of notched vortex finders. The experimental results show that a separator with a notched vortex finder at 225° can remove particles greater than 3.5μm in diameter, while a normal separator can remove only particles greater than 8μm in diameter. Furthermore, the total separation efficiency of the original separator is 0.73, while the total separation efficiency of the improved separator is 0.76.