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A model of a fibrous bed relating the ratio of the outlet and inlet particle number densities to the various system parameters is tested experimentally. The degree of bed saturation is also determined from single phase and two phase flow data. The inlet and outlet particle number densities are determined by light scattering. It was found that the model does predict the effect of particle size, fiber size, bed length, and degree of saturation consistent with experimental observations. However, the coalescence efficiency based upon aerosol filtration theory is not amenable to the fibrous bed over the widest range of flow velocities.

A model of a fibrous bed coalescer is presented which relates the collision frequency between particles and fibers to the overall coalescence frequency. The model will predict the ratio of outlet to inlet particle number densities (Y) and takes into account the mean inlet particle size, mean fiber size, void fraction of the bed, superficial velocity through the bed, degree of bed saturation, and bed length. The ratio of outlet to inlet particle number density, in terms of these parameters, is given by \documentclass{article}\pagestyle{empty}\begin{document} \[Y = \exp \left\{{- \frac{{3(1 - \in)S(1 + d_{10} /d_f)}} {{4d_f (1 - S)}}\eta _e L} \right\} \] \end{document} where η is defined as the coalescence efficiency and varies between 0 and 1 with the fiber Reynolds number.

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