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In order to improve the yield of steel produced in the converter and the quality of the molten steel, and to understand the distribution of the flow field in the converter and ladle during the steelmaking process, the CFD fluid simulation software Fluent 2020 R2 was used to analyze the flow field of the converter static steelmaking process. The aperture of the steel outlet and the timing of the vortex formation under different angles were studied, as well as the disturbance level of the injection flow in the ladle molten pool. The study revealed that in the steelmaking process, the emergence of tangential vectors caused the entrainment of slag by the vortex, whereas in the later stages of steelmaking, the turbulent flow of slag disrupted the vortex, resulting in its dissipation. When the converter angle increases to 90°, 95°, 100°, and 105°, the eddy current occurrence time is 43.55 s, 66.44 s, 68.80 s, and 72.30 s, and the eddy current stabilization time is 54.10 s, 70.36 s, 70.95 s, and 74.26 s, respectively. When the converter angle is 100–105°, it is suitable to add alloy particles into the ladle molten pool. When the tapping port diameter is 220 mm, the eddy current inside the converter changes and the mass flow rate of the tapping port is "oscillating". When the aperture of the steel outlet was 210 mm, the steelmaking time could be shortened by about 6 s without affecting the internal flow field structure of the converter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Liutex vector is new quantity introduced to represent the rigid-body rotation part of fluid motion and thus to define and identify vortices in various flows. In this work, the intermittency and power-law similarity of the Liutex vector in homogeneous, isotropic turbulence and a turbulent channel are explored. First, we found that the Liutex vector is more intermittent than the vorticity vector in the considered turbulent flows, which indicates that an iso-surface of a Liutex magnitude with an appropriate threshold could capture the major rotating motions or vortical motions of the flow. Second, the three-dimensional energy spectrums of velocity, vorticity (enstrophy spectrum) and the Liutex vector in homogeneous isotropic turbulence are shown to exhibit power laws of −5/3, 1/3 and 1/3 in the inertial subrange, respectively, whilst the Liutex energy spectrum particularly satisfies an additional −10/3 power law in the viscous subrange. This viscous similarity of the Liutex vector is the only power law that survived from the wall presence and is argued to originate from the fact that the Liutex vector represents the rigid part of fluid motion and is free from any shear contamination. The existence of such a viscous similarity law indicates a certain coherence of the small scales of turbulence and could possibly help understand and model turbulence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heat transport in rotating processes finds a wide range of application in which academic issues in the fluid mechanics and heat transfer areas are here reported. This paper discusses successive works from the seminal paper of Taylor (1923) to recent numerical results established from a broad range of methods such as DNS, LES, RANS or LB methods. The flow regimes identification is thus reported in Taylor–Couette geometry. The role of the axial flow rates in the apparition, stabilization and destruction of the large-scale of the turbulent structures is depicted in the case of Taylor–Couette–Poiseuille geometry. In a non-isothermal condition, a discussion is held on the various exponent values found in the scaling relationships relying on the Nusselt number as a function of the Rayleigh or Reynolds numbers according to the regimes of thermal convection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A side channel pump is a pump with a high head and a small flow that is widely used in various industrial fields. Many scientists have studied the hydraulic performance, pressure fluctuation characteristics, and gas-liquid mixed transport characteristics of this type of pump. However, these studies mainly focused on the single-stage impeller of the side channel pump, without considering the inter-stage connection channel and the multistage timing effect. These characteristics affect the hydraulic performance and pressure-pulsation characteristics of the side channel pump. Therefore, we carried out a numerical simulation and an experimental comparison on the multistage side channel pump to explore its flow characteristics during the stages. This study focused on the influence of different turbulence models on the numerical simulation of multistage side channel pumps. Shear stress transport (SST), detached eddy simulation (DES), and detached eddy simulation-curvature correction (DES-CC) turbulence models were selected for consideration. By studying the pressure and velocity streamline distribution, the turbulent kinetic energy, and the shape and volume of the vortex core area simulated by the three models, we concluded that the DES-CC model, when compared to the other models, can more fully reflect the vortex characteristics and the simulation results that are closer to the experimental data. The results of this study can be used as the basis for future research on multistage side channel pumps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The instability of surface lenticular vortices is investigated using a comprehensive suite of laboratory experiments combined with numerical linear stability analysis as well as nonlinear numerical simulations in a two-layer Rotating ShallowWater model. The development of instabilities is discussed and compared between the different methods. The linear stability analysis allows for a clear description of the origin of the instability observed in both the laboratory experiments and numerical simulations. While global qualitative agreement is found, some discrepancies are observed and discussed. Our study highlights that the sensitivity of the instability outcome is related to the initial condition and the lower-layer flow. The inhibition or even suppression of some unstable modes may be explained in terms of the lower-layer potential vorticity profile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of a synthetic jet actuator in workplaces entails the necessity of noise reduction, which they generate. One of the methods to achieve this is the use of the chevron orifice or nozzle. Therefore, the impact of different numbers of chevrons and rounding of cutouts in the orifice on the actuator efficiency and the sound pressure level was tested. The chevron orifices were compared to the circular orifice. The time-mean reaction force method was used to measured efficiency and flow parameters, and the noise was measured according to the ISO 3746:2010. The rounded cutouts had an advantageous impact on the actuator efficiency at the power P > 1   W , while the efficiency of the actuator with classic chevron orifice was smaller than with circular orifice. The noise generated by the actuator with the chevron orifice was smaller from 0.6 to 1.6 dB than by the actuator with the circular orifice, at the number of chevrons equal to 7 or more. The rounding of cutouts in the chevron orifice can advantageously impact the parameters of synthetic jet actuators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies on the tip leakage vortex (TLV) are extensive, while studies on the secondary tip leakage vortex (S-TLV) are rare. To advance the understanding of the formation mechanism of the S-TLV, turbulent cavitating flows were numerically investigated using the shear stress transport (SST) turbulence model and the Zwart–Gerber–Belamri cavitation model. The morphology and physical quantity distribution of the S-TLV under two cavitation conditions were compared, and its formation mechanism was analyzed. The results reveal that in the lower cavitation number case, there is a low-velocity zone of circumferential flow near the tip in the back half of the blade. The shear vortices formed by the leakage jet gradually accumulate and concentrate in the low-velocity area, which is one of the main sources of the S-TLV. Meanwhile, the radial jet pushes the vortices on the suction surface to the tip, which mixes with the S-TLV. The flow path formed by the radial jet and the leakage jet is in accordance with the rotation direction of the S-TLV, which promotes the S-TLV's further development. Under the conditions of a small cavitation number and low flow rate, the circumferential velocity and radial velocity of the fluid near the gap have altered significantly, which is conducive to the formation of the S-TLV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]