Performance Characteristics of Centrifugal Slurry Pump with Multi-Sized Particulate Bottom and Fly Ash Mixtures

Abstract

The present study reports on the performance characteristics of the centrifugal slurry pump with multi-sized particulate slurry of bottom ash and fly ash mixtures. The performance characteristic of the pump was experimentally evaluated at rotational speed 1450 rpm for bottom ash slurries with and without the addition of fly ash in the concentration range of 10% to 50% (by weight). Addition of fly ash in the bottom ash was varied from 10% to 30% (by weight). The pump total head, overall efficiency, and pump input power at different flow rates were evaluated. The performance characteristics results show that the value of head and the efficiency of the pump depend on the solid concentration. It was also observed that the performance parameter of the pump strongly depends on slurry properties. The addition of fine particles fly ash in the coarser particles of bottom ash slurry, leads to reduce the additional head losses in the pump. The pump performance in terms of head and efficiency improved with addition of fly ash in bottom ash slurry.