Erosion Investigation of Liquid-Solid Two Phase in Wide-channel Welded Plate Heat Exchanger

In the wide-channel welded plate heat exchanger, the two-phase flow characteristics and the wall erosion in the channel with existence of cylindrical objects was studied. The finding shows that the liquid velocity around the cylindrical objects increases sharply and consequently the erosion on the plate surface surrounding the cylindrical object is accelerated, and the erosion rate increases with the increase of inlet velocity and wall roughness. Compared with the smooth wall, the particles impact the rough wall with higher energy and higher frequency, leading to faster erosion. Therefore, it is important for equipment user to keep appropriate inlet flow velocity, monitoring function of strainer, setting up effective CIP (cleaning in place, CIP) mechanism and observing heat exchanger performance regularly, so as to prolong service life of the equipment.

Libo Ren, Manli Zhang, Hailan He, Xinyan Wang and Limei Zhang
Travaux 51, Proceedings of the 40th International ICSOBA Conference, Athens, 10 – 14 October 2022
Download PDF