Theoretical investigation of a stream; Case study

Calculations have been carried out using the "PHOENICS" for two-phase flow in a concentric annulus with a rotating inner cylinder. The flow in such system for the single-phase flow is well known as the Taylor-vortex flow. The two-phase Taylor-vortex flow has quite interesting characteristics in experiments. With increasing of the rotating inner cylinder, bubbles agglomerate and make spirals or rings owing to the Taylor-vortex. According to the flow visualization of a cross section in the annulus, the bubbles of spirals or rings locate at very close to the rotating inner cylinder and at out-flow region. Calculations carried out to confirm these characteristics and investigate in detail. Two-phase Taylor-vortex flow was calculated in two dimensional cylindrical coordinate with IPSA method. The original k- and k- RNG models are used as the turbulent model. It is confirmed that the Taylor-vortex is obtained in this calculation by the vector of liquid phase. From the void fraction distribution, bubbles exist close to the inner cylinder and locate at out-flow region as same as the experimental results. The calculated results agree with the experimental results qualitatively but we do not obtain the quantitative agreements.