Abstract
Two-phase flows in pipes develop characteristic patterns or flow morphologies. Their transport between process units and plant components often involves short pipes, large pipe diameters, as well as bends and curvatures. The prediction of the predominantly undeveloped flow morphologies in such systems is challenging and subject to high uncertainties due to lacking experimental data and universal engineering models. In this work, comprehensive experimental studies were conducted in horizontal straight and bent pipes of 50 mm and 200 mm diameter. Wire-mesh sensors were applied at characteristic positions to obtain the gas–liquid distributions with high spatiotemporal resolution. Subsequently, a fuzzy classification method is applied to assign a flow pattern to characterize the flow conditions. As this assignment is fuzzy, we introduce an advanced concept of a color-coded flow map visualization for further analyses. As a result, we analyze the effect of pipe curvatures on the flow morphology and its downstream recovery.
Highlights
Piping that connects process units in chemical plants can become complex in its routing as a consequence of request for small plant footprints and space restrictions
This paper focuses on the fuzzy flow pattern identification (FFPI)-based flow classification, further characterization of the transitional morphologies is feasible, when considering more than one degree of membership at the same time
The evolving flow morphologies were systematically analyzed via fuzzy flow pattern identification (FFPI) with an advanced visualization approach
Summary
Piping that connects process units in chemical plants can become complex in its routing as a consequence of request for small plant footprints and space restrictions. Increased distillation efficiency in rectification columns can be achieved, feeding the column with customized two-phase mixtures rather than applying single-phase feeds.[1] At the same time, certain phase distributions at the column inlet may cause severe droplet formation and carryover,[2] which reduces the separation efficiency and increases product impurities. It is commonly accepted that flow characteristics are independent from the axial position, provided a sufficient entrance length is available to achieve a fully developed flow. For such conditions of developed two-phase flow, that is, for straight pipes of small diameter, there is a wealth of experimental data available. Feed pipe lengths of only 10D are commonly suggested for distillation columns.[11]
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