Pressure drop correlation for air/water two-phase flow in horizontal helicoidal pipes

Book · Sun Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1995

OSTI ID:100875

Ebadian, M A; Dong, Z F; Awwad, A; Xin, R C ^[1]

---

1. Florida International Univ., Miami, FL (United States)

In this paper, an experimental investigation is reported for air/water two-phase flow in horizontal helicoidal pipes. The helicoidal pipes are constructed of Tygon tubing with varying inside diameters of 12.7 mm, 19.1 mm, 25.4 mm, and 38.1 mm wrapped around two different cylindrical concrete forms with outside diameters of 304.8 mm and 609.6 mm each. Also, the helix angle of each helicoidal pipe varies up to 20 degrees. The experiments are conducted for superficial water velocity in the range of U{sub L} = 0.008 {minus} 2.2 m/s and superficial air velocity in the range of U{sub G} = 0.2 {minus} 50 m/s. The pressure drop of the two-phase flow is measured and the data are correlated. It was found that the Lockhart-Martinelli correlation for a straight pipe can represent the data for a helicoidal pipe only in the cases of a high rate of flow; nevertheless, the pressure drop relates strongly to the superficial air/water velocity when the flow rate is lower. The helix angle has almost no effect on the pressure drop, although the pipe and coil diameters have certain effects in low rates of flow. Correlations for two-phase flow in each of the horizontal helicoidal pipes have been established based on the present data. Helicoidal pipes are used extensively in compact heat exchangers, boilers, refrigerators, nuclear reactors, chemical plants, as well as the food, drug, and cryogenics industries.

• OSTI ID: 100875
• Report Number(s): CONF-950116--; ISBN 0-7918-1296-0
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

42 ENGINEERING
CONFIGURATION
CORRELATIONS
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
PIPES
PRESSURE DROP
TWO-PHASE FLOW
USES