Experimental and numerical investigation on the bubble breakup and coalescence characteristics in the highly efficient static mixers

Abstract

CFD-PBM and experiment methods were applied to study the bubble dispersion characteristics in the static mixers with three twisted blades (TKSM). The gas-liquid velocity ratio was selected as drag correction factors. The simulation data was compared with experimental values at different superficial gas velocity and the results revealed that the modified model could effectively enhance the calculation accuracy of gas holdup. Furthermore, bubble size distribution (BSD) was well predicted by Luo-Prince model and the mean relative error (MRE) of axial d32 between the prediction of Luo-Prince model and experimental value was 2.86 %. Meanwhile, the influences of bubble collision mechanisms and coalescence correctors on the numerical prediction were quantitatively analyzed. The effects of turbulent fluctuation, viscous shear, wake entrainment and buoyancy driven were considered for the prediction of bubble collision frequency in TKSM. The prediction precision of cumulative probability distribution (CPD) was promoted by 17.26 % when the correctors obtained from Energy-Minimization Multi-Scale (EMMS) method were used. In addition, empirical parameter CDas was evaluated and the results showed that the Das coalescence model could accurately describe the BSD when CDas was 0.01–0.1. The backmixing performance of the gas phase in the TKSM exceeds that of the liquid phase, which is distinct from that in vortex unit.