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2012 IOP Conf. Ser.: Earth Environ. Sci. 15 062025
(http://iopscience.iop.org/1755-1315/15/6/062025)
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IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
1. Introduction
Phenomenon of cavitation influences the performance of centrifugal pump during its running, it can
always cause a series of problems, including abnormal flow, cavitation damage, vibration, noise, head
decline, and even halt of operation sometimes. Thus, researches on the cavitation of centrifugal pumps
must be carried out to ensure the safety, stabilization and high efficiency of performance. With the
development of computer technology, numerical simulation has become an effective method in
cavitation research. General CFD tools, like Fluent, StarCD, CFX, CFDesign etc. are applied and
developed broadly. While in sorts of branch fields, professional codes for special use have been
widely developed also. For example, Airpak and Icepak is the electronic thermal analyzer. AVL FIRE
focuses on engine gross performance. PumpLinx is the professional tool for pump and valve modeling.
In pump simulation, the key points are the cavitation and turbulence prediction in flow domain. But
for most general CFD tools, refer to different cavitation and turbulence models, it is always very hard
to achieve a steady state, and simulation results always deviate severely from test data also. Besides, it
takes too long in mesh building, parameters setting and calculating. To solve these problems, Simerics,
an American company, developed a professional hydraulic numerical simulation software for pumps
and valves which is called PumpLinx. It utilize the full cavitation model that is put forward by Ashok.
Singhal and Jiang Yu, which can solve complicated cavitation problems with good convergence.
Beside numeric Cartesian meshing technique which is based on binary tree method, together with
plentiful pumptemplates embedded in the software can ensure the accuracy and effectiveness of
simulation. This paper takes one type of double suction centrifugal pump for example, uses
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
PumpLinxas the tool of simulation, cavitation and turbulence in flow domain are analyzed, prediction
of NPSH by simulation is compared with test data, the result turns out with excellent agreement,
which verified the reliability of the numerical simulation in centrifugal pump.
2. Simulation
2.1. Governing equations
2.1.1. Basic Equations. The fluid motion in the pump is dominated by basic laws of mass, momentum
and energy conservation. In this paper, heat transfer in the pump is not considered, thus, its basic
equations consist of continuity and momentum equations.
Continuity equation:
d v v nd 0
t t
(1)
Momentum equation:
vd v v n vd nd pnd f d
t t
(2)
where (t ) and are the Volume and surface area of the control volume, n means the normal vector
of point on surface, is the fluid density(kg/m3), P is the fluid pressure(Pa) , v and v are the
velocity vector and surface kinetic velocity(m/s), and the shear stress tensor can be expressed by an
equation related to velocity and viscosity, for Newton fluid, it can bewritten as
u u 2 u
ij i j k ij
x
j xi 3 xk
(3)
In which ui means a component of velocity v and ij is the Kronecker delta function. For centrifugal
pump simulation, turbulence model and cavitation model are needed also.
2.1.2. Turbulence model. Appropriate turbulence model can describe the flow situation inside the
centrifugal pump accurately. Choosing a proper turbulence model can decrease the simulation errors,
and enhance the accuracy of performance prediction. Standard k and RNG are the most widely
adopted models for turbulence modeling in pumps. This paper uses standard k model, which can
satisfy the need of centrifugal pumps turbulence prediction, not only in convergence, but also in
accuracy.
2.1.3. Cavitation model. The most difficulty of cavitation prediction is that density at the interface
between gas and fluid varies extensively. Besides, the position where cavitation generates, the domain
and the shape of bubbles are influenced by pressure field, and pressure filed is determined by
geometry, boundary and operating conditions. The full cavitation model in PumpLinx is based on twophase flow theory, considering the compressibility of fluid and vapors vaporization and condensation
processes in the meanwhile. It takes vapor and undissolved gas into account by introducing the
conception of mixing density, thus, the prediction of cavitation is more reliable. Fornon-condensable
gas, PumpLinx provides four kinds of simulation models for choices, they are:
Constant gas mass fraction;
Equilibrium dissolve gas model;
Variable gas mass fraction;
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
fd v v n fd ( D f t )(f n)d ( Re Rc )d
t
f
(4)
where D f is the diffusivity of the vapor mass fraction, f is the turbulent Schmidt number.The vapor
generation rate Re and the vapor condensation rate Rc are shown as
1
Re Ce k 2
l v 2 P Pv 12
[
] 1 f v f g
l 3 l
l v 2 P Pv 12
Rc Cc k
[
] fv
l 3 l
1
2
(5)
(6)
In which the model constant Ce and Cc equal to 0.02 and 0.01, l and v are the density of fluid
and vapor, l is the surface tension, f v and ean the mass fraction of vapor and non-condensable gas.
The mixed fluid consists of pure fluid, vapour and non-condensable gas, The calculation of the
mixture density is modeled as
fv
fg
1 fv f g
(7)
Value
20
998kg/m3
Dynamic Viscosity
0.001003Pa.s
Vapour Pressure
3610Pa
Vapour Density
0.0245kg/m3
2.310-5
2.15109 Pa
2.2.2. Mesh generation. Mesh the flow domain by using the embedded mesher in PumpLinx. The
special binary tree mesher can create cartesian cellswhich has excellent orthogonal, split automatically
at clearances, sharp edges etc. with thicker cells, so that the flow domain can be described with less
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
cells but higher precision. Besides, the operation is simple, efficient and timesaving. For this double
suction centrifugal pump, we use this one key meshing method to generate meshes for each part of the
flow domain. Figure1 shows a binary tree mesh on a cutting plane passing through a centrifugal and
Figure2 shows a partial scheme of the binary tree mesh on the leading edge of the blades.The whole
job can be finished in several minutes, and the number of cells is about 500000.
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
Figure 5. Total volume fraction of cavitation in impeller under different inlet conditions.
describes the bubbles forming, flowing and deforming. While, cavitation does not cause damage itself
unless bubbles are fractured on the surface of walls. The cavitation damage model in PumpLinx can
help engineers to predict the probable region of cavitation damage, and make improvements in design
to prevent damage happening in real.
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
IOP Publishing
doi:10.1088/1755-1315/15/6/062025
4. Conclusions
Based on the analysis of numerical simulation of the double suction centrifugal pump with PumpLinx,
the results turn out:
The head result of the pump under design condition deviates 1.8% from the test data, the
precision is acceptable.
The pressure distribution in the impeller is reasonable, however, there is apparent lowpressure
region generated, cavitation performance needs to be improved.
By comparing the cavitation damage prediction with the test data, we find that damage
happens where cavitation damage power surpasses 5108W, this is very important for
structure and optimization.
The calculated NPSHr by PumpLinx is about 11.5m, it is about 6% lower than the test data of
12.2m.The probable sources of the inaccuracy include: a) The position of the inlet in
PumpLinx does not match the corresponding monitor in test equipment perfectly. b) Heat
exchange is not considered in simulation, while heat created by friction and ambient transfer
may influence the flow course as well. c) The material properties in PumpLinx are simplified
comparing with the actual situation, especially the value of gas mass fraction, its really hard
to estimate the actual value in fact.
Overall, PumpLinx is a reliable and efficient tool for centrifugal pumps flow and cavitation
analysis. Its embedded pump templates, binary tree mesher, and advanced full cavitation model can
ensure high precision and convergence. In the meanwhile, simulation time needed is shortened greatly,
not only in meshing, setting, but also in calculating. Thus, engineers can spend more time on pumps
performance assessment and optimization.
References
[1] Liu Y, Zhao X F, Qi X Y, Hui W A and Zhang W J 2008 Journal of Lanzhou University of
Technology 34(3) 44-47
[2] Ma F Y, Yang G P and Wu W W 2011 Fluid Machinery 4 30-34.
[3] Samuel A L, Jiang Y and Michal F 2007 High Fidelity Modeling for Liquid Pump Design (USA:
SAE Int.)
[4] Singhal, Athavale, Li H and Jiang Y 2002 Journal of Fluid Engineering 124(3) 617-624
[5] Ding H, Jiang Y, Visser F C and Furmanczyk M 2009 Demonstration and validation of 3D CFD
simulation tool predicting pump performance and cavitation for industrial applications 2009
ASME Fluids Engineerings Division Summer Meeting (Vail, USA, 2009)
[6] Su Y S, Wang Y S and Duan X Y 2010 Thansactions of the Chinese Society of Agricultural
Machinery 41(3) 77-80
[7] Pan Z Y, Ni Y Y, Li H and Cao Y J 2008 Drainage and Irrigation Machinery 26(4) 35-38