Study of Effectiveness of Cone Cruciform Vortex Breaker Device in Reducing the Swirl Angle by Modifying the Number of Vanes Using CFD Technique

Abstract

Abstract

Many of the large-scale vertical pumps installed in various pumping stations have experienced some sort of vibration, impeller damage due to local cavitation, excessive bearing wear, or loss of pumping efficiency, combinations of which are considered to be caused primarily by undesirable pump approach flow conditions such as vortices, swirl in intake structure, and inappropriate geometrical layout surrounding the bellmouth. Conventional fixes to resolve these problems include vortex breaker devices such as a cone and cruciform vanes vortex breaker which is designed with a common cone and the different number of vanes to improve the flow to the bellmouth. In this study, CFD analysis of the flow in the pump bay with vortex breakers having two, four, six and eight number of vanes is done in each case and the swirl angle is calculated.

Keywords: Vortex breaker device, cone cruciform vortex breaker, swirl angle, cruciform vanes

Cite this Article

Swamy Devappa Renuka, Mohammed Sameer, Pritesh Shetty. Study of Effectiveness of Cone Cruciform Vortex Breaker Device in Reducing the Swirl Angle by Modifying the Number of Vanes Using CFD Technique. Recent Trends in Fluid Mechanics. 2018; 5(2): 36–50p.