Investigation of viscous flow phenomena in a rotating system

Abstract

In this work we have investigated viscous flow in a rotating system. The system consists of a horizontally oriented cylindrical drum rotating around the center and a fixed plate as a scraping internal tool. By this plate the inner volume is divided into two separate chambers. No mass transport between the chambers can take place. The drum is completely or partially filled with a highly viscous, optically transparent silicon oil. In the second case the remaining space is filled with air as a passive phase. Depending on the settings in the system, which are the rotational speed of the drum, material properties of the liquid and the volume ratio of the two phases, different flow phenomena can be observed [1, 2]. For the characterization of the flow dimensionless ratios given by the Reynolds number Re, the Froude number Fr, the Capillary number Ca and the volumetric filling degree F are used. The system is investigated applying the experimental method of Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) as well as suitable models of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). The goal of this investigation is to identify the velocity fields in the liquid phase for a better understanding of the observed phenomena. The results obtained by the different methods are presented and discussed. (© 2009 Wiley‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)