Numerical investigation of the effect of leakage flow on cavitation in centrifugal pump

Abstract

Numerical studies on pumps emphasize mainly on modelling the interactions between the impeller and the volute to obtain an accurate understanding of the physics involved. However, the importance of modelling leakage paths, which is known to have a significant influence on the flow structure in the pump, necessitates an in-depth analysis. This activity is undertaken in this paper by investigating a specific case of a centrifugal pump. Numerical studies have been conducted on the pump modelled with and without leakages for the design condition. The sliding mesh method is used to obtain single phase pressure pulsations data at some important locations in the volute and the leakage path, and transient Multiple Reference Frame (MRF) modelling is utilized to conduct the cavitation analysis. It is observed that for the case under study, the pressure pulsations pattern and the cavitation behaviour varies significantly due to the inclusion of leakage paths in the analysis.