Observing the thermodynamic effects in cavitating flow by IR thermography

Abstract

When dealing with liquid flows, where operating temperature gets close to the liquid critical temperature, cavitation cannot be assumed as an isothermal phenomenon. Due to the relatively high density of vapor, the thermodynamic effect (decrease of temperature in the bulk liquid due to latent heat flow) becomes considerable and should not be neglected. For applications like pumping cryogenic fuel and oxidizer in liquid propulsion space launchers, consideration of the thermodynamic effect is essential - consequently the physical understanding of the phenomenon and its direct experimental observation has a great value.This study presents temperature measurements in a cavitating flow on a simple convergent-divergent constriction by infrared (IR) thermography. Developed cavitating flow of hot water (∼100°C) was evaluated by high-speed IR thermography and compared with conventional high-speed visualization, at different operating conditions with the velocity range at the nozzle throat between 9.6 and 20.6m/s and inlet pressure range between 143 and 263kPa.Temperature depression near the nozzle throat - near the leading edge of cavitation was measured in a range up to ΔT=0.5K. This confirms the presence of the thermodynamic effects by cavitation phenomenon and it is in agreement with its theory. In the study, average temperature fields, fields of temperature standard deviation and time-resolved temperatures, are presented and discussed. In addition, statistical analysis between temperature drop and cavitation flow characteristics is shown.