Flow characteristic and separation performance of co-current gas-liquid vortex separator

Abstract

A co-current gas-liquid vortex separator (C-GLVS) with a built-in closure hood is proposed to improve the separation efficiency. The internal flow field and separation performance are investigated with respect to different operating conditions by cold modeling experiments. The C-GLVS is divided into three zones, i.e., the separating zone, the discharging zone, and the settling zone. The lowest static pressure and the highest tangential velocity are observed in the separating zone. Furthermore, A swirling gas stream (r/R = 0.75–1) around the bottom of the closure hood prevents the droplets entrainment flowing upward from the wall area, which is believed to be benefit to gas-liquid separation. Experimental results also show that the introduction of the closure hood enables the gas-liquid separation efficiency of C-GLVS to achieve 98.6%, which is about 22.76% higher than that of GLVS. The pressure drop of the gas discharging accounts for about 60% of the total pressure drop.