Study of fluid flow movement of biodiesel production with helical static mixing reactor using computational fluid dynamics(CFD)

Abstract

The simulation was carried out using the computional fluid dynamics method to find out and read the flow pattern in the reactor. Simulations were implemented in nine reactors, which every reactor have 12 helical type static mixer elements. The elements in every static mixer are twisted 180°, and between elements are glued at an angle of 90°. Also performed two scenarios on the modification of the torsion angle of the elements, namely 225° and 270° . Based on the flow velocity and viscosity, the static mixer with 270° torsion angle has a good mixing pattern compared to the torsion angle of 225° and 180° . The viscosity was descresed by 5.4% and the velocity was increased by 3.05%. The concentration of fatty acid methyl ester using static mixer 270° (as much as 97.50%) was higher than the 225° torsion angle (as much as 97.46%) and the 180° torsion angle (as much as 97.41%).