Study of Effective Factors on Separation Efficiency of Vane Separator

Vane plates are considered as one of the most efficient devices in industry which are widely used to eliminate liquid droplets from gas flows. In this study, the two-phase flow of gas-liquid between the wavy plates of a type of vane separator was simulated using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) technique and influences of three independent factors of inlet gas velocity, vane spacing and vane angle on the separation efficiency were investigated. To model the liquid-gas flow, Eurelian-Lagrangian approach was applied and separator efficiency was evaluated within a velocity range of 3-8m/s while mass fraction of liquid droplets in the gas flow was 0.089. The liquid film breakup phenomenon was considered in these simulations. Having compared simulation results with experimental data, we realized that there was an average error about 0.9% in simulations. Regarding the simulation results, vane separation efficiency depends on inlet gas velocity and geometrical parameters of the vanes.