Numerical and Experimental Study of splitter blades effect on the centrifugal pump performance

As pumps are used frequently in industrial plants, their performance improvement is important. In this study, performance improvement of centrifugal pumps by application of splitter blades have been investigated both numerically and experimentally. Radial impellers with different length of splitter blades have been manufactured and tested to obtain performance charts. On the other hand, the flow in impeller and volute has been investigated numerically by ANSYS-CFX commercial code. Numerical study has been done using Finite volume method and k-ωSST turbulence model. Rotating and stationary frames have been used to analyze flow in impeller and volute respectively and the results have been coupled by Frozen Rotor. Three impellers with the lengths of splitter blades equal to 0, 33% and 66% of original blades were tested. Results show head increase when the splitter blades added while the amount of increase depends on the splitter blades length. At BEP (Best Efficiency Point) the maximum head increase was reported for impeller type three (the length of splitters equal to 66% of original blades) about 10.5 percent. It should be noted that as the capacity tends to BEP, the effect of splitter blades is more significant.