Predictions of Phase Distribution in Liquid–Liquid Two-Component Flow

Abstract

Ground-based liquid–liquid two-component flow can be used to study reduced-gravity gas-liquid two-phase flows provided that the two liquids are immiscible with similar densities. In this paper, we present a numerical study of phase distribution in liquid–liquid two-component flows using the Eulerian two-fluid model in FLUENT, together with a one-group interfacial area transport equation (IATE) that takes into account fluid particle interactions, such as coalescence and disintegration. This modeling approach is expected to dynamically capture changes in the interfacial structure. We apply the FLUENT-IATE model to a water-Therminol 59® two-component vertical flow in a 25-mm inner diameter pipe, where the two liquids are immiscible with similar densities (3% difference at 20°C). This study covers bubbly (drop) flow and bubbly-to-slug flow transition regimes with area-averaged void (drop) fractions from 3 to 30%. Comparisons of the numerical results with the experimental data indicate that for bubbly flows, the predictions of the lateral phase distributions using the FLUENT-IATE model are generally more accurate than those using the model without the IATE. In addition, we demonstrate that the coalescence of fluid particles is dominated by wake entrainment and enhanced by increasing either the continuous or dispersed phase velocity. However, the predictions show disagreement with experimental data in some flow conditions for larger void fraction conditions, which fall into the bubbly-to-slug flow transition regime. We conjecture that additional fluid particle interaction mechanisms due to the change of flow regimes are possibly involved.