Experimental pressure drops during the water flow into porous materials realized via additive manufacturing

Abstract

Open-cell foams offer several interesting possibilities in numerous technological fields. In fact, they present high surface area to volume ratio as well as enhanced flow mixing and attractive stiffness and strength. However, their complete and reliable characterization has not been completed yet. In fact, there is still no a comprehensive work that relates all the foam geometrical characteristics to their heat transfer and pressure drop features. This paper is the very first outcome of a larger study that aims at realizing open-cell foams via additive manufacturing, testing them, then generating a simulation model based on the real geometries to numerically optimize each parameter. The present manuscript presents the construction of the open-foam via 3D printing and the experimental pressure drop measurements when water flows through the foam.