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The effect of using the soft fins on a horizontal pneumatic conveying of granular particles in various curved 90° bends was studied in this paper, in order to reduce pressure drop and conveying air velocity. Experimental measurements were performed in terms of the pressure drop, conveying air velocity, power consumption and additional pressure drop. The distributions of particle velocity near and in the curved 90° bend were measured by high-speed PIV. The test pipeline consisted of a 4.5 m-long horizontal straight acrylic tube, a curved 90° acrylic bend and a 1.5 m-long horizontal straight acrylic tube, having an inside diameter of 80 mm. The polyethylene particles with diameter of 2.3 mm were used as conveying materials. The superficial air velocity was varied from 10 to 14 m/s, and the solid mass flow rate was fixed at 0.45 kg/s. Comparing with the dilute phase pneumatic conveying, the pressure drop, the minimum pressure drop (MPD) velocity, power consumption and additional pressure drop can be reduced by using soft fins for various bends in lower air velocity range. The reduction becomes more evident with increasing the radius ratio of bend. The maximum reduction rates of the MPD velocity and power consumption by using soft fins is about 8.2% and 11.7%, respectively. At the upstream of bend, the particle velocity of the soft fins is evidently higher than that of the dilute phase in the bottom part of pipe for all bends. The effect of soft fins on the particle velocity and its fluctuating energy still remains in the bend and the downstream of bend, and the fluctuating energy of particle velocity gradually decreases through the bend. At the downstream of bend, the fluctuating energy of particle velocity decreases with increasing the radius ratio of bend. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In order to reveal the reduction mechanism of conveying velocity and pressure drops in a horizontal self-excited pneumatic conveying by using soft fins, the distributions of particle velocity and concentration were measured by the high-speed particle image velocimetry (PIV) and image process at the minimum air velocity. The study focuses on the effect of the different fin’s lengths on the horizontal pneumatic conveying in terms of frequency features of fin’s oscillation, time-averaged particle concentration and velocity, fluctuation intensity of particle velocity and power spectrum of particle fluctuating velocity. It is found that the particle concentration of the fins is lower than that of non-fin near the bottom and is higher than that of non-fin near the top of pipe even at low air velocity. In the acceleration regime, the normalized particle velocity of the long fins is higher than that of non-fin, implying the efficiency of the long fin on reducing pressure drop and conveying velocity. For conveying particles having the relatively large terminal velocity, however, there is little effect of fins on particle velocity. The fluctuating energy of particle velocity of fins are larger than that of non-fin near the bottom of pipe, and the long fins exhibit the largest value in the top part of pipe in the fully developed regime. Based on analyzing the power spectrum of particle fluctuation velocity, it is indicated that the fins generate the large peaks of power spectrum in the low frequency range, which is related to the reduction of pressure drop. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]