Experimental investigation on the bubble formation from needles with and without liquid co-flow

Corné Muilwijk, Harry E.A. Van den Akker

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

We report experiments on bubble formation from needles with and without liquid co-flow, carried out with needles in the range of 0.79<dn<2.06 mm, for gas flow rates up to 4.5 cm3/s per needle, and with liquid co-flow velocities up to 0.4 m/s. Bubble sizes and frequencies were obtained by means measuring an acoustic signal in the pressurized chamber upstream, which is validated by high-speed imaging analysis. Bubble contours, bubble growth curves and time return plots were obtained to analyse the bubble formation process. Different bubbling regimes are distinguished and a novel dimensionless pressure ratio is proposed to forecast the emergence of weeping and the transition from constant flow rate bubbling to constant chamber pressure bubbling. A single correlation for the non-dimensional bubble size with and without liquid co-flow was developed and validated with the experimental data obtained in the present study.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)318-335
Number of pages18
JournalChemical Engineering Science
Volume202
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 20 Jul 2019

Keywords

  • Acoustic signal
  • Bubble formation
  • Image analysis
  • Liquid co-flow
  • Orifice constant
  • Period-2 bubbling

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