EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF TWO-PHASE SLUG FLOW THROUGH AN UPWARD VERTICAL TO HORIZONTAL TRANSITION

Maikon Bressani¹; Ricardo Augusto Mazza¹

¹ Universidade Estadual de Campinas

doi:10.20906/CPS/COB-2015-0474

Resumo

The two-phase slug flow is extremely affected by gravity, however most of the related studies focus on flow analysis with constant inclination pipes. The influence of the elbow in vertical to horizontal transitions is not well-known despite its importance in pipeline systems. This work's objective is to study the influence of this kind of transition in the main slug flow parameters: the liquid slug and bubble lengths, translational bubble's velocity, among others. In order to accomplish this, an experimental setup was developed with an upward vertical section connected to a horizontal one by a 90o elbow of long radius. Impedance probes before and after the elbow were used to measure the slug flow parameters. The elbow was also instrumented with impedance probes making it possible to measure the bubble's velocity and the other parameters along the elbow in various positions. In all test cases there were no significant influence of the centrifugal force into slug flow parameters along the transition, which is consistent with the previous literature for inclined pipes. The presence of the transitions doesn´t significantly affect the translational bubble's nose velocity and bubble's lengths. There was a little influence in the liquid slug length.

Palavras-chave: Slug flow; Flow through bends; Two-phase flow; Bubble velocity