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Numerical investigation on the mechanism of impeller hub corner separation flow and induced energy loss in the bulb tubular pump

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Abstract

Impeller hub corner separation flow (IHCS) has a significant influence on energy conversion of the bulb tubular pump, and its unsteady characteristics are investigated with CFD-based method. The generation mechanism and power loss characteristics of IHCS are investigated by the entropy production method and pressure fluctuation analysis. The main cause can be attributed to the large transverse pressure gradient near the hub at the trailing edge of the impeller, which is aggravated by the circumferential movement trend and the diffuser reverse flow, while the IHCS is significantly weakened with increased flow rate. The undesirable flow behavior is more likely to cause a significant increase in energy loss near the hub region compared to that in the rim region. The relative vortex stretching induced by the velocity gradient is the main cause of the horn-like vortex (HLV), and its intensity and resulting energy loss tend to decrease along the vortex trajectory. The HLV changes the dominant frequency of the pressure fluctuations in the nearby flow field, the value of which increases from 1fr (the blade passing frequency) to 2fr with increased amplitude, mainly due to the lower pressure regions on the impeller suction surface (SS) and HLV vortex core. Due to the effect of rotor-stator interaction (RSI), the HLVs generated between two adjacent impeller blades are cut into several sections by the diffuser vanes and propagate and dissipate along the mainstream direction.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province for Distinguished Young Scholars (Grant No. BK20211547), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. BK20220542), the Key R & D projects in Jiangsu Province (Grant No. BE2021073) and the Graduate Research and Innovation Projects of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. KYCX21_3356).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Center of Fluid Machinery Engineering and Technology, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China

    Long-yue Sun, Qiang Pan, De-sheng Zhang & Rui-jie Zhao

  2. Wenling Fluid Machinery Technology Institute of Jiangsu University, Wenling, 317525, China

    Qiang Pan

  3. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands

    B. P. M. (Bart) van Esch

  4. Shimge Pump Industry (Zhejiang) Co., Ltd., Wenling, 317525, China

    Qiang Pan

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  1. Long-yue Sun
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  5. B. P. M. (Bart) van Esch
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Correspondence to De-sheng Zhang.

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Ethical approval: This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.

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Conflict of interest: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest. De-sheng Zhang is an editorial board member for the Journal of Hydrodynamics and was not involved in the editorial review, or the decision to publish this article. All authors declare that there are no other competing interests.

Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51979125, 52209111 and U2016225).

Biography: Long-yue Sun (1989-), Male, Ph. D. Candidate

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Sun, Ly., Pan, Q., Zhang, Ds. et al. Numerical investigation on the mechanism of impeller hub corner separation flow and induced energy loss in the bulb tubular pump. J Hydrodyn 35, 252–267 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42241-023-0021-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42241-023-0021-3

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